FROM MAIN STREET TO STOCKHOLM LETTERS OF SINCLAIR LAWIS. 1919-1930

8X3 L676z 53-

Lewis

From Main Street to Stockholm

14 19(76

i a i //

MAR 2 7

FROM MAIN STREET

TO STOCKHOLM

COPYRIGHT, 1952, BY

MELVILLE H. CANE AND PINCUS BERNER

EXECUTORS OF THE ESTATE OF SINCLAIR LEWIS

All rights reserved, Including
the right to reproduce this book
or portions thereof in any form.

first edition

PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

Contents

Introduction **

AIN STREET

I. The Beginning of a Career 3

II. Publication and Success 37

F ABBITT

HI. Creation Abroad 7 1

IV. A Reputation Established 104

ARROWSMITH

V. The Scientist as a Hero 121

VI. Travel on Two Continents 159

ELMER GANTRY

VII. Portrait of a Preacher *93

VIII. Trouble in Kansas City and Boston 233

DODSWORTH

IX. Marriage and Divorce *49

X. The Nobel Prize 269

Index 33

Introduction

When in December 1930 Sinclair Lewis rose to his feet in a palace in
Stockholm to deliver the most unconventional Nobel Award address to
which that distinguished gathering has ever listened, he made two con
tradictory statements. He said that he had always been fortunate; and
later that the American novelist must work alone, in confusion, unassisted
save by his own integrity. If Lew^ s asjJiJI^
Nobel Award for Literature^ was not at that moment the most celebrated
novelist in the United States, he was soon to become so when the Amer
ican press, through the most vocal of its columnists, editorial writers, and
literary pundits, blazed with indignation at his attack on such sacred
institutions as William Dean Howells, Mark Twain, our universities, the
Academy of Arts and Letters, and the New Humanists. Neither of his
two statements was quite true as far as his own life was concerned. No
man can be called consistently fortunate who has had to work for ten
years alone and in confusion, and Lewis had endured the indifference of
critics and the public to his novels before Main Street brought him fame
almost overnight. For eleven years before the Nobel Award he had been
assisted by the devotion and ingenuity of a young publishing house. Aside
ff om a forgotten book for boys written under a pseudonym, he had pub
lished before he came to Harcourt, Brace four novels which had got him
nowhere near his goal, and he had worked for a score of magazines, news
papers, and press associations until in 1914 he became an editor of George
H. Doran s flourishing publishing house. What he wanted of life was
freedom from routine tasks so that he could devote all of his energy to
writing the novels that were forming in his mind.

He learned in the hard school of experiment how to write short
stories for two or three magazines and for George Horace Lorimer, the
famous editor of the Saturday Evening Post who had given a chance to
many youthful writers and who had created a national institution out of

x INTRODUCTION

a small magazine. They were not very good short stories, as Lewis well
knew, but they served their purpose. He was aware finally that he had
won the long battle for freedom. The drama of his startling rise to fame
was soon to begin. The publisher he needed was waiting off-stage, though
neither Alfred Harcourt nor Sinclair Lewis was at the moment conscious
of it.

The involvement of these two men in each other s fortunes came
about when Harcourt was in the trade department of Henry Holt and
Company, and Lewis was respectably performing editorial and publicity
functions across the street in the office of George H. Doran and Company.
Harcourt had been brought up in New Paltz, a village in upper New
York state; Lewis in Sauk Centre, an equally small community in Minne
sota. They began to take lunch together in the ornamental grill-room of
the old Waldorf on Fifth Avenue, and the narrowness and oddities of
village life often proved to be a more interesting topic than books and
authors. Lewis had a passion for the little people submerged in the cities
and the crossroads of America; he had written about them in his unsuc
cessful novels, and he had an idea stirring in his head that would not let
him alone.

Even in those early days he was one of the most stimulating rapid-fire
conversationalists in America. He was also a youthful reformer with the
illusion that the lot of men and women would be bettered if their faults
could be pointed out to them. In the course of these meetings Harcourt
realized that he had found a writer who had a capacity for enthusiasm
and indignation, an astonishing memory for detail, and a new approach
to contemporary American life.

The die was cast the day Lewis walked into Harcourt s office at
Holt s, shut the door and said, "Alf, I m going to write that small-town
novel you ve been pestering me about. The title is Main Street and don t
you mention it to a single person." Then the wheels began to turn. In
1916 Lewis gave up his editorial work with Doran to devote himself to
writing. Two years later he drove across country to the West Coast with
his wife, Grace Hegger Lewis, in their Ford, and then back to Sauk
Centre and his father s house to write a serial for Lorimer based on the
trip. This was Free Air, the first of his books published by Harcourt,
Brace, an innocently romantic and adventurous story of a small-town
garage hand who fell in love with a girl from Brooklyn while she was
motoring through the Middle West.

In the spring of 1919 Alfred Harcourt resigned from Henry Holt
and Company. He wrote Lewis at Sauk Centre that he did not know
what he was going to do, whether to accept a post with another house or
start his own firm. Lewis wired Harcourt to meet him in New York the

INTRODUCTION xi

following Sunday morning. "What I came on to say is," he told Harcourt
at once, "don t be such a damn fool as ever again to go to work for some
one else. Start your own business. I m going to write important books.
You can publish them. Now let s go out to your house and start making
plans."

He was taking a risk that few ambitious young writers would have
contemplated, for it meant that he was leaving an established publishing
house for a business venture that even in the best of times is hazardous.
He had given his word; he was loyal, yet he was shrewd enough to sense
that a firm headed by Alfred Harcourt and Donald Brace might succeed
and would give to the books he was to write the enthusiasm and devotion
he hoped for.

There was another aspect to his decision to gamble with his future.
Sinclair Lewis had a morbid fear of loneliness, perhaps the most obvious
trait in his complex nature. He wanted to have friends. He liked and was
charmed by women, but as in the case of so many men, the company of
the most devoted and intelligent woman could not take the place of the
conversation of male companions. But his friends were always drifting
away from him. They could not keep up with him; or they could not
endure for long the close scrutiny of an endlessly inquiring mind, or the
long satirical monologues in which he imitated with astonishing virtuosity
the accents of characters he had not yet brought to birth. Oddly enough
he never parodied women; but the voices of long-winded men in smoking
cars, of Babbitts and Elmer Gantrys and the men who knew Coolidge
were always echoing in his friends ears.

/Sinclair Lewis was determined to alter America s conception of itself.
Early in his career he foresaw that he might win the Pulitzer Prize and
the Nobel Award. He was linked with a publishing house from which he
could safely wander to whatever part of the globe he pleased, and he felt
that others who might join the enterprise would also be friendly associates
in his ambitious design. The letters in this book, drawn from the files of
Harcourt, Brace and Company, tell part of the story, from the founding
of the firm to Lewis s last letter written in 1931 from Germany, where he
had retreated after the Stockholm ceremonies were over. They do not tell
all of it. Part of the story was developed in conversation rather than let
ters, for Lewis was spending a certain amount of his time in and around
New York. This was particularly true of the period preceding the Nobel
Award and at other times indicated in the notes that go with the text.
During the later years when he was gaining all he might have hoped for
it is evident from his letters that his interest lessened in the way in which
his victories had been won. He had become used to large figures and no
longer was eager for the latest news and reports from the office.

xii INTRODUCTION

Lewis had for several years served the company unofficially as a
scout and as its envoy in England and France, After Babbitt was pub
lished in London, there was an immense curiosity about the man who
had revitalized American literature, so that he was welcomed every
where. Harcourt, Brace had acquired an extremely important list of
British writers-John Maynard Keynes, Lytton Strachey, E, M. Forstcr,
Virginia Woolf, and others of the Bloomsbury group-and to him they
were all part of the firm. He describes in his letters the parties and dinners
he attended, the houses he lived in, and his travels in England, France,
Italy, and Germany.

Through this correspondence the reader can discover the admirable
qualities of Sinclair Lewis which were often not apparent to chance ac
quaintances or even to those who met him frequently. He was unfailingly
courteous and thoughtful of those who were associated with him. His
opinions of the writers he met through his connection with the firm were
shrewd. Occasionally his evaluation of the work of a young writer with
whom he had made friends was too generous, though he always surren
dered gracefully and rarely argued with the editorial opinions of the
office. Though he was desperately anxious for success, he wanted others
to take advantage of the expanding opportunities for American writers.
He was not jealous of those who shared the limelight with him, or angry
at adverse or unfair criticism. When one of his books failed to live up to
his hopes, like The Man Who Knew CooKdge, or Mantrap, lie revealed
his anxiety but never did he hint that he was disappointed in his publisher.

These letters reveal a brilliant and dynamic man, deeply concerned with

social problems, generous, restless, often unhappy, meticulous in his finan
cial affairs, and almost exhaustively so in the accuracy of the details with
which he surrounded his characters, so that the notes which he made
before he began to write a novel were often as long as the completed
manuscript. There are certainly no letters in the history of American
publishing quite like this correspondence between Harcourt, and other
members of the firm, and Sinclair Lewis.

HARRISON SMITH

MAIN STREET

ONE

The Beginning of a Career

[1919]

315 South Broad Street,
Mankato, Minn,
June 12
Dear Alf :

Working hard on Main Street. Like this town immense. I wrote to
Herbert E. Gaston (director of Nonpartisan League publications) about
the NPL book, and he writes that he ll get in touch with you. He s soon
going to Chi and may go on to NY. You might write him, especially if
you ve settled yet where your office will be. If he doesn t do the book,
he ll know the best man to do it.

Lots of luck! Much regards to Mrs. Harcourt and Ellen Eayrs. 1

Zever,
slews

117 Lorraine Avenue,
Mount Vernon, N.Y.
June 1 6
My dear Lewis:

After some confusing offers of rather extraordinary jobs, every thing
is cleared up, and we are going after our own business. I think the firm
name will be Harcourt, Howe and Brace. 2 Howe is at the moment the
head of the English Department at the University of Indiana; the author
of a set of school readers of which Scribner s have sold 5,000,000; editor
of their Modern Students Library; and a corking fellow of about forty

1 Harcourt s assistant.

2 Incorporated as Harcourt, Brace and Howe, July 29, 1919.

4 MAIN STREET

who can give us a hook-in on school book business. He brings some
capital, but so many fine books are showing up that I think we shall need
all we can get. Do you really want to put some money in? We ll give you
preferred stock with at least 6% dividends guaranteed. I don t think we
will need it until late in the fall, but of course we want to know what we
can count on. Now be absolutely frank about this.

Do you know Free Air is making a hit? My neighbors and their
wives are saying it is one of the most interesting and refreshing things
they have seen in the S. E. P. (Saturday Evening Post) for some time,
and people in the trade are talking about it. Brace hears the same report.
You have heard from Bobbs-Merrill and probably from a good many
other directions. At any rate, set yourself down and, with all the skill
you can muster, write to Henry Holt and Company (our correspondence
is in their files) explaining, if you wish, how you came there because of
personal relations with me, and ask them to let you have the Free Air
contract back. I think you will get it all right. You might address E. N.
Bristol 1 direct.

Things look rosy to an unbelievable degree. We re off in a cloud
of dust!

Ever yours,
Alf

Mankato, June 16
Dear Alf:

Here s a carbon of a letter from me to Holt Co. Main Street goes
apace (none of your biz what pace). Doing nothing else, and really am
under way. Got an office address yet?

Zever,
SLewis

{Enclosure}

Mankato, June 15
Dear Mr. Holt: 2

I wonder if I can, without impairing our good personal relations, ask
for the return of the contract on my book Free Air?

There are two disconnected reasons. First-as I wrote to Harcourt
long before there was the slightest hint of his severing connections with
Henry Holt and Company you ll find the letter in the files when I

1 Vice president and treasurer of Henry Holt and Company.

2 Roland Holt, son of founder and president of Henry Holt and Company, and
vice president of the company.

[1919] 5

started to work to add to the ms to bring it from the present serial length
of 56,000 words to a length suitable for book publication, I found that it
would be such a long job that I cdn t with the work already in hand, do
it till sometime next year. And in its present short form it hasn t quite
the dignity I want in my next book. Now as other tasks may keep com
ing in and preventing my properly enlarging and developing the book,
I don t like to have a contract for it out, even with the understanding
that it s not to be published till I do properly complete the work.

Second, despite my long and hearty respect for the Company and
my personal liking for you and others, yet after all Harcourt has always
been the man in the firm whom I have best known and with whom I have
done business, as book reviewer and fellow publisher and author, and
while I don t know what his plans are, I want to be loyal to him and
stick by him.

I understand that one of the fundamental principles of the Company
has been to hold authors by their own desire rather than by the semi-
compulsion of contracts, so I put this directly to you, and hope that you
will see it in the decidedly friendly light in which I see it.

I am here in this Minnesota town for the summer and I like it; like
the friendliness, the neighborliness, and the glorious sweeps of country
round about.

Sincerely yours,
Sinclair Lewis

Mankato, June 19
Dear Alf :

I like the name The Harcourt Company better than Harcourt, Howe
and Brace, just because it s shorter, but the other is good too. Just how
much time can I have before I decide about taking some stock? I certainly
would like some, but of course just now my problem is that I m writing
Main Street and living on what I have ahead, and as I can t tell how long
it will take me I don t dare to invest and risk having to go back to short
stories before I want to. I certainly ought to have some ahead next fall,
but don t know now, so don t like to promise. I also don t know yet about
the musical comedy version of Hobohemm 1 when Smith 2 will finish it
and get it on. If I got a wad out of that, I d like to put it into your
business a real investment.

1 Lewis s first play, a satire on life in Greenwich Village, produced in New York
February 8, 1919.

2 Harry Bache Smith. Librettist who collaborated at different times with Victor
Herbert, Irving Berlin, and others.

6 MAIN STREET

Free Air seems to be making a great hit here too, but I still suspect
that it d be wise to put it off till after Main St. Before getting your letter
I d written to Roland Holt; if I don t hear satisfactorily from him, I ll
write to Bristol, as you suggest. GOOD LUCK!

As ever,
si

Mount Vcrnon, N.Y,
June 23
Dear Slewis:

I raise my two-year-old Panama to the letter you wrote Henry Holt
and Company. You wrote before you received mine suggesting such a
letter, and I am glad because the letter couldn t have been improved upon.
It might have been less good because of some hang-over from my letter.
We ll treasure it as a model.

I arranged with Gaston Saturday morning for a book on the Non-
partisan League. 1 He is getting right at it. Things are coming along
unbelievably well for us in every direction,

Ever yours,
Atf

In care of Tobcy and Co.
5 West 5oth St., New York
June 27
Dear Slewis:

Don t tear your shirt about capital We have enough to turn over on.
We should not need any from you until late fall or the first of the year.
It could be left that if you do want to put money into our business and
with the money conveniently in hand, we should be delighted to have you
in to the extent and in the fashion that will make you feel most comfort
able.

I keep hearing about Free Air, and my hunch is that if we let that
wait a year or so, it is going to be pretty stale and that the impetus which
the enjoyment of the serial has created will be lost, Don tells me they have
sent your contract back from Holt s. What I really wish you would do is
to get Free Air into the best shape you can by the first of August and let
us make a book of it. You ought to make up your mind about this right
off and perhaps let us have a telegram, as we have to make a fall list by
i The Nonpartisan League by Herbert E. Gaston, HB&Co,, 1920.

[1919] 7

the first of next week. If you do take my point of view, very shortly after
you have sent the telegram, mail us a description. Also send us the first
chapter or two to make a dummy. Then we can get advance orders this
summer. Gehrs 1 is going to stay at Holt s until the first of October, but
we have made arrangements whereby he can sell our fall line on his sum
mer trip for them-and I am afraid our line will get all the emphasis to
which it is entitled!

I am sending you a copy of the results of our last week s activities.
We are getting a book or two a day and all first-class ones. That is, we
are going off with a bang. We have no quarters yet, but we have a tem
porary place at 5 West 5oth St. which I hope we can make permanent.
The lawyers are working on the incorporation, and in a week or ten days
we shall be all set and going.

As ever,
Alf

Mankato, June 30
Dear Alf:

In answer to your letter I wired you I ll finish Free Air for book in
two or three weeks. I m sending you today the first 166 pages, all ready
to print, so that you can not only make a dummy but really start setting.

Go ahead and make up a contract when you are ready no hurry. I
do NOT want an advance. But equally, you don t get anything on movie
rights I have a wire from Brandt 2 saying Famous Players offer $3000
for movie rights.

I ve tried to make a resume of the story, without success. I enclose
my abortive attempt. I hate writing abt 8 my own stuff did too much of
it at Doran s.

Getting lots of good letters about the story, praising it heavily. It
should be especially pushed in Minn, NDakota, Montana, Washington.
Here s an idea for an ad;

Whenever you see the sign

FREE AIR

before a garage think of
the one book that makes motoring romantic

FREE AIR

1 August H. Gehrs, sales manager of the new firm,

2 Carl Brandt, New York literary agent.

8 Lewis often used this form of telegraphese," dropping vowels from words, and
it has been retained throughout.

8 MAIN STREET

Or something like that. We ought, somehow, to be able to take advantage
of the publicity implied in all the tens of thousands Free Air signs before
garages and filling-stations.

Oughtn t the book to have four or five charming illustrations: I
think Arthur William Brown or Dean Cornwell would do em better than
Gruger did in the Post; still, Gruger s were pretty good, and we cd prob
ably get em from the Post cheaply.

As ever,
si

Mankato, July 3
Dear Alf:

Hard at work on end of Free Air 7 and it s going fine. If Louise Bryant,
wife of Jack Reed and my good friend, comes to see you, be extra nice to
her and buy her a Oh gosh, you can t, even 2.75%.

si

Mankato, July 14
Dear Alf:

Miss Eayrs asks me to send her the original Free Air Holt contract,
for use in making new one. Two changes arc that you are NOT to pay me
an advance, and that you don t get anything on movie rights. You can
come in on dramatic rights. There won t be none!

I ve received check for Free Air movie, and I can now, if you want
to monkey with so small a sum, invest $2000 in the firm. That s all I d
better venture now. Later in the year I may be able to increase that
considerably. No way of telling. But I d sure be glad to invest the two
thousand now, if you d like.

Ought to have the new part of the book done, but between heat and
long continued plugging I got so tired that I laid off for a week and took
my dad on the long motor trip I told you about he enjoyed it enor
mously; saw the places he knew as a kid but hasn t seen for from 30 to 50
years. Now I m back on the job and will hustle the end of the book thru.

I wonder if you can work any publicity in combination with the
movie production of Free Air? Ought to be something good in it It s
been bought by Famous Players-Carl Brandt can probably tell you who
is doing their publicity. They ll probably be pushing the picture at just
about the time of publication of the book.

Zever,
Sinclair Lems

[1919] 9

Tell Miss Eayrs to quit working so hard. I know her!

Why don t you try to buy rights to earlier books from Hoyns? 1 No

further word from him since the last letter I sent you.

5 West 5 oth St., N.Y.

~ T .

Dear Lewis:

Now that we know the length of Free Air, Brace has sent it to the
printer; meantime we have used the serial version to have a jacket made
that is a wonder.

I am so glad you had that trip with your father. The year before my
dad died, we drove to Niagara Falls and back, and it s a rare and dear
memory.

We would really like very much to have your $2000 in the business.
Our articles of incorporation go to Albany Monday, and we shall be ready
to issue stock as soon as it can be printed. You had better keep the money
in your bank until I write you that the stock is ready to exchange for it.
I believe and hope it will be a good investment for you.

We have found offices after tramping all over this town at i West
47th St., the first floor and basement in a nice old private house, and you
will never have a warmer welcome anywhere, except in your own home,
than when you come to see us there. I think we shall have an extra room
upstairs with a bed in it for such wandering wayfarers as you, so don t go
to a hotel the next time you come to town until you have found out if we
haven t a comfortable place for you.

You know I sort of expect a killing for Free Air. We are going out
for one, anyway.

Zever,
Alf

Mankato, July 22
Dear Alf:

Til be sending the rest of Free Air to you in less than a week. I think
the new stuff is more than up to the rest of it, and it s in no sense padding.
In fact, when I originally planned it, I d intended to have in all this Seattle
matter, then stopped short because I didn t want to make my first Post
serial too long. Grace 2 says it s the best part of the story.

1 Henry Hoyns of Harper and Brothers, publishers of Lewis s earlier novels, Our
Mr. Wrenn, The Trail of the Hawk, The fob, The Innocents.

2 Grace Livingston Hegger and Lewis were married at the Ethical Culture
Church, New York, on April 15, 1914.

10 MAIN STREET

In view of this, of the fact that I ve added almost 30,000 words
nearly doubled the story it s important for your salesman in talking to
book dealers to emphasize that only about half the story appeared in the
serial. And how about putting that on the jacket? Or is it better not to
admit on the jacket that it has appeared as a serial? If such an admission is
made, there should certainly be a good note about the new half Milt up
against city social complications the small-town garage man going to the
opera in his first evening clothes. Think that over for jacket note, and
use or not as seems best to you. It might do something to counteract the
bad effect of Post serialization, and mite be so worded that those who
liked it in the Post will get the book. It might also go into a literary note,

Glad you ve found offices, and many thanks for your warm welcome
to them.

Sincerely,

Here s a true literary note. I ve heard of several people who arc now
driving from Middlewest to the Pacific Coast because of reading Free Air.

Mankato, July 25
Dear Alf :

Next Thursday, July 31, just after mailing you the end of Free Air,
Grace and I are going to start motoring East. If you should need to get
hold of me before I go, you could telegraph me. I don t know of anything
you ll need to wire me about, however, and I ll reach the East sometime
after the middle of August.

We re going to spend the winter in the East just where, we don t
know yet We ll look for a house on the way. It probably won t be more
than a hundred or a hundred and fifty miles from NY. We re going to
look at West Chester, Pa., where Hergesheimcr lives.

CHECK:

So that I ll be sure to have it in to you, I m enclosing the check for
two thousand for stock. Yea, I ll trust you, even tho I know your weak
ness for large lunches. You can have some stock made out in my name,
and HOLD the stock.

PROOFS:

I don t know when you plan to issue Free Air, so I don t know
whether I ll be East early enough to read proofs you can t coimt on me
to do it till after September ist. Do NOT hold up the book. If someone
reads-proofs fgr me* have them change the population of Gopher Prairie
(the first town where Claire stops for the night) to make it agree with

[ 1919] 11

Main Street. When I read proof for the Sat Even Post, I transferred those
corrections to the book ms, and that will help some tho of course Brer
Author can always find some new changes.

I would wait here for the proofs, but I m all in been grinding too
long and hard, need a vacation bad, and it s a good stunt to use it in this
Eastern trip, as we ll be going East anyway. We plan (unless it gets too
hot) to go down thru Tennessee and Virginia, so it ll be quite a trip. By
the way, if they want to go, I ll take Father and Mother at least as far as

Chicago.

PHOTOGRAPHS:

I ll have some new photos taken when I get East, and there ought to
be some bully snapshots along the road, peculiarly appropriate to Free Air
publicity.

Think over the use of the "When you see a Free Air sign in front of
a gas station, thing of the one book that," etc. and the plan of having ads
in the motoring and sporting journals, and maybe an inch or two or three

in the S.E.P.

ADVANCE COPIES:

(Lewis sent in at this time a remarkably complete list of the most impor
tant American critics, newspapers cmd magazines carrying book reviews.)

I can t think of anything else to insult you with this is my last shot
at you (giving you a chance to reply, at least) before I hit the road. But
don t wire me, "You poor fish, don t you suppose I know a little about
the publishing business?" I ll assume that answer, and save money for
. , . my firm!

Back to work copying the bloomink book.

As ever,
S Lewis

i West 47th Street, N.Y.
July 28
Dear Mr. Lewis:

Mr. Harcourt and I moved to this address x last Monday. We spent
one week in a tiny cubby-hole in the basement, encircled with piles of
trash and paint pails. From where we sat, we could see legs descending the
stairs to call upon us; after a time sufficiently long to guess at the owners
of the legs, a head would appear. We entertained a lot of distinguished

1 These were the first quarters of Harcourt, Brace and Howe, and this letter was
written the day before the firm was formally incorporated.

12 MAIN STREET

visitors; even Mr. Ellery Sedgwick s x legs called upon us, and he was
impressed-how he didn t say. This morning we moved to a lovely room
on the third floor where we shall be until the first of October, After that
we shall all be in our rightful quarters on the first floor. The explanation
of all this is that Mr. Harcourt has taken the first floor and basement of
an old red brick house; he could get the basement at once, and the first
floor on October first, so for the sake of being at the permanent address,
we are going to be in this house. He will write you fully about all this as
soon as he has time. I write this so that you shall be in on the first struggles
of a poor but honest young man!

Sincerely yours,
Ellen Eayrs

July 28
Dear Lewis:

I think you will get this reply to your good letter of the 25th before
you leave. I am glad you are taking the trip. It will do both of you a
world of good. I ve sold the Oldsmobile and bought a Ford. The latter is
cheaper to run. The new car came yesterday, and it was fun finding all
the grease cups.

I hereby acknowledge the check for $2000. We cannot issue stock
to you until you sign our stock book in person. We ll have it all ready
for you when you come in.

I hope you won t be disappointed when I tell you that the book will
not be illustrated. With present costs of manufacture, the book would
have to be $1.75 instead of $1.60. Gruger s drawings were not good, and
the other people were not within reach for a hurry-up job, and I d rather
have the $500 for extra advertising, window display posters, etc.

When you get East, find out whether my house is vacant or not be
fore you camp out here. Sue and Hastings 2 are going up to Dorothy
Canfield s 8 for six weeks or two months after the i5th of August. I have
asked Howe if he wants it when he comes on about the i5th; I have not
heard from him, and it may be that I shall be there alone, and you can
put your car in the garage and the baby in Hastings s room etc* I am very
glad you are going to be East this winter. No time for more now. I envy
you the trip and the good time.

Ever yours,
Alf

1 Editor of the Atlantic Monthly. 8 At Arlington, Vermont.

2 Harcourt s wife and son.

[1919] 13

Lewis and his *wife drove East by way of Tennessee and Virginia) stop
ping off to see James Branch Cabell in Virginia. They arrived at West
Chester, Pennsylvania, on August

c/o Joseph Hergesheimer
West Chester, Pa.
Wednesday, September 3
Dear Alf :

As I telephoned you from Phila yesterday, the whole business of the
serial publication of the end of the book is unusual I was at Lorimer s, 1
and when he asked me what the deuce I d been doing all these weeks,
and I told him, he, not I, suggested my showing him the new parthence
the hasty wire to you. He immediately accepted it, with enthusiasm, and
it seemed criminal to miss the good money in hand. But I was more wor
ried than you will believe about the matter of book publication. As a
matter of fact, with the difficulties of make-up, I was afraid that he d
demand a postponement of publication till way into November; was
afraid I might have to refuse the serial publication. When I saw him
yesterday, I went into that first of all, and I think he s more than decent
to rush it through so soon.

But of course that doesn t help you any. I wonder if this will be of
any valuelet the bookdealers know, by word of mouth thru Gehrs,
what is the exact truth that Lorimer liked the new part so much he
simply had to have it, which certainly ought to increase their interest
in it. Let them know that a lot of readers have been clamoring for more
Free Air, and they get it in the book. Something like that?

This new part will be published (in the Post) under the title Danger
Rtm Slow. Lorimer gives October 20 definitely as the release date. He s
not even setting galley proofs but getting it right into pages.

I hope to God this works out all right. I think I ve given enough
previous proofs of my interest in your success so you may be sure that,
while craftily grabbing off this money, I also devote a whole lot of
thought and worry to you, and hope and pray that I haven t been either
inconsiderate or foolish in this.

I wonder if some time I can t get Lorimer and you together. I can t
tell you how much I admire Lorimer, both for his ability and his incred
ible niceness in his dealings with authors.

We have a house here, but we don t get into it till about the 1 5th.
Meantime we re at a hotel, but you can address me care of Hergesheimer.

I m terribly disappointed in the pictures we got on the trip. The
ones I m sending are the best. With them are some pictures of James
1 George Horace Lorimer. Editor-in-chief of the Saturday Evening Post.

14 MAIN STREET

Branch Cabell and myself, taken in the Virginia mountains. His new book
Jurgen will be published by McBride this fall.

As ever,
Sinclair Lewis

September 5
Dear Lewis:

We are so infernally busy that I haven t time to clo more than ac
knowledge yours of September 3rd. It is only truthful to say that we hate
to postpone Free Air, but there is comfort enough in knowing that it is
a favor to you and in having our enthusiasm confirmed by Lorimcr s mak
ing two sei ials of one story and thinking so much of the ending that he is
standing on his head to get it into the Post. Of course booksellers will be
afraid that complete serialization in the Post will blanket the market, and
this may affect advance orders, but I don t believe it will affect the total
sale. Good luck always!

Ever yours,
Atf

Burlington Hotel

Washington, IXC.

Tuesday
Dear Alf :

Fve been down here house-hunting (with not much success yet),
We decided that West Chester would bore us and Washington we like
tremendously. Don t know when we ll be where, but chances are well be
here at the Burlington for several days to come.

Sincerely,
SL

1814 1 6th Street, N.W.
Washington, D.C
Monday
Dear Alf:

Above is our new address-and we really will keep that one all
winter! Even after an arduous week of house-hunting, we adore Wash
ington-it has all the stimulus that we found little gray West Chester to
lack, yet also a clean quietude that New York lacks. We have a small but
comfortable house, into which we move next Friday.

[ 1919] 15

If Howe has come, give him my greetings, please.

Sincerely,
Sinclair Lews

September 25
Dear Lewis:

It is good to think of you as settled in Washington, The advertising
suggestions are good. Send more along as they occur to you. I don t agree,
however, about advertising in motor journals. I think we can get a good
deal of free publicity from that crowd, but when people look at those
journals, they are looking for accessories, not books. We want to give
away copies liberally in that field.

It looks as if the 8000 copies we are having bound will just fill the
advance orders and leave us enough to see how the cat is going to jump.
Not bad, I think.

Ever yours,
Alf

Washington, October 6
Dear Alf:

Your catalogue came this morning, and I think that it is remarkably
impressive, especially for a first one. It ought to make an interesting stir.

There is just one criticism, but I think that is important. And it s my
fault, seeing that it s based on something I did. . . . The Free Air de
scription sounds too much as though this were a typical Munsey-Popular
Magazine outdoor adventure romance. It seems to me the line we must
stress is that here is romance with dignity and realism that Milt, in his
garage, in his adventuring, is as true to life as though this were a drab
story of manners instead of a romance. And there is no hint of the Seattle
experiences one who had read the first part in the Post would have no
way of knowing there was anything in the book not found in that first
part in the magazine.

Please PLKASE think very carefully about giving the keynote of the
book in future ads and descriptions, so that it may stand out from the
typical Zane Grey ads.

As ever,

Sinclair Lewis

P.S. Send me 20 copies of Free Air as soon as you have them. I shall use
several for furtherance of selling.

16 MAIN STREET

October 7
Dear Lewis:

Thanks for your recent letters. I have been just too busy to answer
them. This thing is growing like the green bay tree. You know the first
of the quotation. Don and I have been here until 10: 30 almost every night.

Twenty copies of Free Air have been sent to you, We have sent
copies with a special note from me to Harry Korncr and John Kiclcl. 1
We sent out about 1 30 to sales people, and on most of those either Gchrs
or I wrote a personal word. Be dead sure you don t give any of the 20
copies to anybody who will go into a bookstore before the 23rd of Octo
ber and say "The book is published; I know it is published; I ve seen a
copy" etc. I d really rather you kept them under your pillow until the
1 8th, Advance copies outside of the trade raise the very dickens some
times.

Haven t heard a word from Hoyns, I ought to run into him at a
Publishers Luncheon soon.

We re putting another 3000 Free Air to press. Have orders for 5200
without Baker & Taylor or N.Y.Qty except Amer News which takes
1000. Expect advance of 8-9000.

Yours,
Alf

October 20
Dear Lewis:

Free Air looks so promising that I m going to suggest a joint gamble,
We are spending (besides $500 on window displays, dealers letters, etc.)
$1000 (10^ a copy on the first 10,000) in regular advertising to give it an
initial push. Do you want to say you will accept a 10% royalty on the
first 10,000 if we will spend the 5% you forego on a further splurge in
advertising and also spend a like sum ourselves? If you want to say you ll
make it 10% to 15,000 we will, as soon as we ve sold 10,000 outright,
appropriate a further $1000 to keep up the push. Now, do just as you
please about this. I think it will pay us both. We may get this book over
into really large figures; every copy we sell now starts talk and means
that many more advance orders for Main Street. I d like to spend a con
siderable part of the extra money on Chicago and the West,

Let me know how this strikes you. I ought to hear almost by return
mail, for it looks as if I d sail for London on the 28th and there is much
to do.

Yours ever,
A.H.

1 Cleveland and Qncinnati booksellers.

[1919] 17

Washington, October 22 Wednesday
Dear Alf :

I received your letter at 7:30 this morning, and about 9:30 tele
graphed, "Yes, gladly agree to reduction to 10% up to 15,000 copies for
extra advertising appropriation." In other words I quite agree with all the
suggestions in your letter that I forego 5% of royalty, on condition that
it be used, with a like sum supplied by you, for further advertising; and
I agree to do so not only on the first 10,000, but on the 5000 after that.
And maybe laterwe ll see.

As you say, it will be well to use some of this new fund on adver
tising west of Chicago particularly, I should think, in Minneapolis, St.
Paul, and Seattle,

Let me know anything else I can do, and if there s a quick answer
necessary, Til telegraph. I don t suppose there s any necessity of our get
ting together before you go away, and I have no plans to visit New York
for Gawd knows how long, but if you should really need to see me, I can
always be in NY in five or six hours.

It may be that, before you ever get Main Street, you ll have another
novel of mine that ought to have twice the sale of Free Air, but will be in
some degree of the same general character the story of a young couple
bucking society in a city like Minneapolis; a story of that never yet
adequately described but extremely important phase of American life
middle-class existence in an American cross between town and city, in
Minneapolis, Omaha, Binghamton, and all the rest. I am planning such a
story, with a lot of drama and unexpectedness but also complete reality,
as a serial for Sat Even Post, and I may do it before I go on with Main St
which will almost certainly NOT go as a serial. I may call the new story
either Cobra in the Dark or The Dark Alley. Do you like either title?

I think that s all!

As ever,
si

October 23
Dear Lewis:

Thanks very much, old man, for your telegram and your letter falling
in so heartily with our plans. I have real hopes they will pay us both. We
are attempting to follow every suggestion you are making and others
which occur to us. Spingarn 1 has the matter in hand, and he and Miss
Eayrs will follow it up, as I expect to sail on the Adriatic Saturday noon.

1 J, E. Spingarn (later referred to as Joel or JES) . Author and critic and a direc
tor of the new firm.

18 MAIN STREET

Send suggestions just as freely to them as you would to me. I have gone
over the whole scheme with Spingarn and it will sail smoothly. Good
luck!

I like the novel which may precede Main Street except that I don t
like either of your titles.

Sincerely yours,
AJJ.

Washington, November 2
Dear Mr. Spingarn:

Let me take this opportunity to greet you and to express my pleasure
in having heard from Harcourt that you are on the bridge while he is
away. ... As it s he who s on the ocean that seems to be a rotten meta
phor, but metaphors we must have, at all cost.
Let rne know anything I can do.

Sincerely yours,
Sinclair Lewis

Washington, November i 2
Dear Ellen:

You re a corker to take all the trouble with Free Air and to write me
the family details about the firm. I enormously like hearing them all of
them. I hope I m not overdoing suggestions about publicityI shall al
ways expect you or A.H. firmly to turn down any you don t like.

Note the underlined lines in the enclosed clipping. Would it be
perfectly insane and egotistic to suggest that you or Mr. Spingarn send a
copy of the book to the prize committee, suggesting that the dern thing
is a study in "the wholesome atmosphere of American life" etc.? 1 I think
a letter with the book would be necessary, in order that the committee
might not hastily conclude as some reviewers seem to be concluding
that because it is a romance with a motor car, therefore it has no serious
study of factualities. Please don t follow this up unless it seems advisable.
It would be a gamble in any case.

As ever,
si

During Harcourfs absence in Europe, Lewis corresponded with the office
from Washington about details concerning the publication of Free Air.
1 Lewis was referring to the Pulitzer Prize Committee.

[1919] 19

Washington, Monday, December 1 5
Dear Alf :

You ought to be getting back to the office at about the time of the
arrival of this letter, so its purpose is both to welcome you back and to
give you some news. I have now written about 70,000 words of Main
Street and am going right ahead with it, instead of doing the dangerous
thing of again putting it off while I write a Post serial! I have no idea that
it will make a serial, and I have every hope that it will be ready for
publication in the spring certainly for early fall, possibly last week in
August. You mustn t suppose that 70,000 means it s almost done though.
I m afraid I shall be doing well (there s such an enormous and complicated
field to cover) if I keep it down to 1 80,000 words, even after cutting first
draft. But I ll keep it down as much as I can.

If it takes long enough, I may have to stop once or twice to write
short stories for the Post, but if so, I ll go right on again. Whether it s
good or not of course I can t tell, but there is this fact usually indicative
of some excellence: I m enormously enjoying writing it, and unusually
interested in itindeed I m not thinking of much else.

Not only have I written 70,000, but also, for a starter, I have rewrit
ten all of the 30,000 words I had written last summer before I broke off
to finish Free Air, and I know the new version is much better. It will be
a great deal better than The Job and I hope that it will give you the
chance for a big campaign and perhaps a big sale. (Tho I don t expect it
to sell to lovers of Harold Bell Wright. It s pretty out-and-out.)

How does the Free Air situation frame up, now that Xmas is ap
proaching? Do you feel anything like satisfied with the sale? I am more
than satisfied with your efforts and Miss Eayrs s and those of all the rest,
and my only reaction to the whole thing is a hope that you have made
some money on it and that it forms a good introduction to Main Street.

There is one thing we must keep in mind from the first: Whether
because Free Air came out in the Post, or because of the wording of the
advertisements, or the wording of the jacket, almost all reviewers (the
NYTimes almost the only exception) have concluded that not only is this
merely a light adventure novel, but that it lacks all f actuality, all "serious
ness"; so they have not bothered to read it at all, but, god damn them,
have merely given fake reviews. This feeling of theirs must NOT extend to
Main Street. We must be very careful about ads, advance notices, jacket
note,* everything, or we shall have them not reading the book. And yet,
same time, we mustn t in those descriptions of the book convey the im
pression that it is too heavy and lugubrious and "highbrow." I think one
thing we might do is to send a letter to about a dozen reviewers (Francis
Hackett, Mencken, Burton Rascoe, etc.) telling them frankly that we

20 MAIN STREET

know Free Air and Innocents were light, but in Main Street this brilliant
young author far beats his justly celebrated The Job, etc. I have such a
letter ready, and we might send it out a month in advance of publication
to a carefully culled list.

I give this long drool so far in advance that we may all be prepared.
I ll NEVER do a novel more carefully planned and thought out and more
eagerly written than Main Street^ and I hope to see it go for years, as
Jem-Christophe goes. If it does, it will be fine for all of us. So let s not
spare any pains and an important part of this will be planning the key
note of all ads, announcements, etc.

You could, if you wanted, begin to let hints of the coming chef
duffer leak out any time, now that the novel s so well under way. And
now, with apologies for so long a letter so soon after your return, back
to writing the novel!

As ever,

Sinclair Lewis

* Fll be glad to write as many of these as you want, tho I couldn t with
Free Air.

December 17
Dear Lewis:

The fact that I have just read your letter of the *5th to Alf is respon
sible for starting me on this letter. I know Miss Eayrs has been giving you
the news, and I have been so busy since Alf has been away that I have not
had a chance to do anything I didn t absolutely have to, Free Air is not
doing what we hoped it would* I cannot see that we have done or left
undone anything that would be responsible for this, and the thing that
comes back to us from every source is the Post serialization, especially
the second one. We have sold about 8000 copies. I am sure we have done
everything we can before Christmas, and we shall see what more we can
do after.

I am delighted that you are getting along so well with Main Street.
Alf is on the Baltic which should have been in yesterday, but will prob
ably not be here until tomorrow or Friday. Of course he will write you
as soon as he gets a chance after his return.

Sincerely yours,
Don

December 22
Dear Lewis:

This is just a stop-gap, Merry Christmas note to say that I got home
Saturday, after a wild voyage of two weeks, with a trunkful of new

[1919] 21

books. The Britishers opened their arms to the new business in a way that
astonished me.

Of course the best part of your letter is that you are really at work
on Main Street, and you are dead right in what you say about the atmos
phere in which the book must be launched. I think the most important
element in creating that atmosphere is that it shall not be serialized in the
Post. I don t know the details of what has happened to Free Air. It hasn t
done all that we hoped for, but on the other hand there is a re-order for
50 copies from Los Angeles in the mail this morning.

No time for more today. Aren t you going to get up here before
long?

Ever yours,
Alf

Washington, December 24
Dear Alf:

Much merry Christmas and a great New Year. You betMain Street
will NOT be serialized in the Post; almost certainly it will not be serialized
in ANY magazine. I don t think I shall even send a copy to any magazine
for consideration. I m booming ahead with it, tho I ve had to stop for
about a week because my father and mother are here, on their way to
Florida. December 26 I ll be into it again.

Harry B. Smith is at last making the musical comedy out of Hobo-
hemiaTvQ seen the first act, and it ought to go. There ought to be a little
money to back me while I do novels. It s a joy not to be writing for
magazines always.

About Free Air: my only hope is that its not going big will not dis
courage you. You remember that at first I advised against its publication
in book form at all. While I m not, of course, entirely indifferent to it,
all my thoughts and planning are centered in Main Street which may,
perhaps, be the real beginning of my career as a writer.

I wonder if about six months before the novel is to come outwhen
you have the msit might not begin to create great interest to publish an
advance announcementnot as a publicity note but as an ad, in Times,
Tribune, Boston Transcript, Pub Weekly and one or two others. Say it s
to come out August 25 of next yearpublish on March 15 or April 15
just a one- or two-inch ad in each paper to the effect that:

Harcourt, Brace and Howe announce that five months from now, on August
25, they will publish a novel of extraordinary importance as a realistic picture
of American life Main Street by Sinclair Lewis. (The book will not appear
as a magazine serial.)

22 MAIN STREET

(Only probably flash up the title more get it fixed in people s minds so
that they will be ready, and possibly eager, for it. If you get any reaction,
republish it once a month.)
Or, more simply:

MAIN STREET

Sinclair Lewis

will be published next August.
A book of importance a genuinely
realistic picture of American life.

I don t think this long-advance announcement has ever been done and
ought to affect book-dealers & readers.

Look, Alf, and heed. Through all my letters, the next few months,
there will probably be suggestions, sometimes just one sentence, for Main
Street publicity, etc. Why don t you have all of the suggestions of any
possible importance copied and kept together, for future use. OTHERWISE
THEY RE ALMOST CERTAIN TO GET LOST, and to be forgotten by both you
and meand it ll be a bore, later, to have to dig them out of the files.

I hope to God you have made at least a little money out of Free Air.
Don t worry about me.

And now on with the job (I m stealing two hours from showing
Dad about, today) and a Great New Year for All of Us, and a hell of a
success for all of us with Main St and everything else. My very best to
your wife, the boy, Ellen, Don, Gus, and all

As ever,

rf

P.S.: I ll be glad to make a contract on Main St so that I put part of my
royalty into advertising (possibly up to 25,000 copies), as on Free Air.

[1920)
January 13
Dear Lewis:

We have been and are as busy as can be with some 50 books (mighty
few lemons in the lot too) to publish by the first of April. We ll have a
list of them off to you soon. You bet we ll keep all your Main Street
suggestions together. Sure, we have made some money out of Free Air,
and I think you will have something over a thousand dollars coming to
you out of it.

I have just read Jurgen. It s a humdinger; the man gets away with
murder, but it s as able a job as I ve seen for a long time. I think you arc
by way of knowing the author pretty well. Is he our sort, and are we

[1920] 23

his n? I don t think the chances are in favor of his being comfortable
where he is very long. If you haven t read Jurgen, please stop and do it
before you do anything more about it; if you have and decide to get
after Cabell in our behalf, go to it.

Ever yours,
Alf

Washington, Thursday
Dear Alf:

Here s a copy of the letter I am sending today to Cabell. Yes, I have
read Jurgen, and admire it enormously. In the last Nation is an ad quoting
me about it. Yes, you would like Cabell, very much.

Working hard on Main Street and doing nothing else. Going to be
one grand book. I should think we might plan it for very early next fall.
Probably won t have it done till April anyway, too late for spring
publication.

I wonder if we couldn t sell some Free Air s in the spring, late spring,
when people are thinking about and planning coming motor tours? Would
it be worth while to advertise it then as the one guide and inspiration for
such trips? These recent motor articles of mine in the Post (three of
them, called "Adventures in Automobumming") have aroused consider
able attention and brought me a lot of letters. See them? Pictures of me.

Regards to Don and Ellen and Gus and the several Harcourts.

Sincerely,
si

[Enclosure]

Washington, January 1 5
My dear Cabell:

I heard from Alfred Harcourt of Harcourt, Brace and Howe, lately,
and I find that he is extremely interested in Jurgen. If you ever get in the
least dissatisfied with McBride, I do wish you would think of Harcourt as
your publisher. As I told you last summer, I chose him from among a lot
of publishers who were after Free Air because, though at that time the
firm wasn t yet really in existence at all, I have known Harcourt long and
intimately. When he was general manager at Holt, I saw him, at different
times, from the standpoint of author, book reviewer, and fellow publisher,
and in each capacity I had more admiration for him than for any other
publisher in the country.

He is a remarkable combination of sound business man and sound
critic, and he does not seem to be afraid to advertise booksor to keep on

24 MAIN STREET

continuing to push them even at that time when the ink on their pages is
beginning to dry, and, therefore, most publishers hate to go on selling
them,

His partners are also extremely able, and I hear that he is going to
have a splendid list this spring. As he is still young in the game, and as he
seems to believe in you, he would be an awfully good man to be con
nected with. Won t you think him over seriously? Of course I know
nothing of your relations with McBride, but if they arc at all unsatisfac
tory, why don t you write to Harcourt and see what he will say? I d like
to have you captured by the same firm which holds me in amiable serf
dom.

As ever,
Sinclair Lewis

February 6
Dear Lewis:

I have been going over the figures of the money we spent in adver
tising Free Air to determine the exact number of copies on which we
were to pay you a royalty of 10%. As so much of it was spent with
dealers on a fifty-fifty basis some of them sent us bills, and some of them
deducted the amount from their remittances it is a very considerable
task. I am convinced that it would save us a couple of days work and
considerable correspondence, and save you twenty-five or thirty dollars,
if we agreed to pay you 10% on all we sold last year and 15% on sales
beginning January first. Will you be satisfied with this rough-and-ready
approximation, or are you curious to have us make a complete report?
I hope you aren t.

I am spending a little money on it now in Chicago. We are getting
re-orders from the Middle West, and now that the travelers are out there,
there may be a considerable revival.

I enclose our spring list which I think will stir you. It is weak on
fiction, but next fall we shall have Main Street, a new Dorothy Canfield
novel, 1 an Elias Tobenkin, 2 and four bang-up English novels at least- The
Keynes book 8 is selling like the dickens, We printed and bound 4000.
These are all gone and now we are selling them faster than we can print
them.

Ever yours,
Alf

1 The Brimming Cup, but not published until March 1921,

2 The Road, published January 1922,

8 John Maynard Keynes: Economic Consequences of the Peace, January 1920.

[1920] 25

Washington, February 8
Dear Alf :

A year ago today, first night of Hobohemia, and you and I went!

Sure: I quite agree to the approximation of which you write 10%
to Jan. ist, and 15% for this year. Don t take time to figure it all out &
make complete report.

Aren t I the darndest best author to deal with? But it s all camouflage
so that I can be frightfully emotional and demanding over Main Street by
and by. My hope is that you re going to have that for your big book for
next fall, and possibly as a big seller for some seasons after. I believe that
it will be the real beginning of my writing. No book and no number
of short stories I ve ever done have ever meant a quarter of what this
does to me. I m working on it 24 hours a day whether Fm writing or
playing.

Grand spring list. Great beginning, old man! Saw Heywood Broun
down here last night, and told him what a grand publisher you are. I agree
with him, and against you, about the title of his book; Seeing Things at
Night has more charm to it than Things Seen at Night. 1 - I m sicking Fred
Howe onto you with a new book he s writing. 2 If you two get together,
and if his book goes, you can take over his earlier Scribner books.

Don t forget that if you decide to take over my Harper s books, you
better do it before next fall and Main Streetbut as that gives you many
months, no hurry about it.

As ever,

Sinclair Lewis
We must announce Main Street early enough to keep the title cinched.

Washington, Thursday
Dear Alf:

Isn t Laski s review of Keynes in the last Nation a wonder? And
perfect for quoting in ads.

Oh. Lay off Cabell. Not a chance to get him. He s absolutely tied up,
by his own desire, to Guy Holt of McBride s. I saw Holt here this week
and he s a wonder intelligent, energetic, and broadly trained in publish
ing, and enthusiastic about you. Be a fine man for you to get hold of, if
ever possible.

As ever,
Lewis

1 Published as Seeing Things at Night, HB&Co., 1921.

2 Frederic C. Howe: Denmark: A Cooperative Commonwealth, HB&Co., 1921.

26 MAIN STREET

With the exception of one short trip to New York in April, Lewis re
mained in Washington during this period, working on Main Street, His
correspondence with the office continued, but was mainly about business
details.

Washington, Friday
Dear Alf :

Gosh I m rusty on writing advertising, and gosh but it s hard to
describe a long realistic novel. But I ve made the effort and am enclosing,
as the Boss commands, two accounts, one about a hundred, and one about
two hundred words long; and a third about the people. If nothing else, I
hope they ll give you a basis for stuff of your own, I m also writing Grace
(who won t be back here till Apr. 26) to try a couple accts of the novel,
as she s read it all.

I m doing absolutely nothing but work on Main Street. Before June
ist I ll be able to give you an exact estimate of the length of the whole
thing, together with, say, 100,000 words to start setting; and be able to
give you all the rest by June 1 5th, or earlier,

I m cutting immenselynever cutting for the sake of cutting, but
invariably removing any paragraph or sentence that doesn t cany weight,
I think it will come down to somewhere around 170,000 words. Why
don t you announce the thing in Pub Weekly at least? Say, fella, you
better send me copy of Nonpartisan League. Don t forget I m the father
and mother of that book who suggested it? Heh? (If it doesn t sell, my
Heh may not be so loud. . . ,)

As ever,
si

April 17
Dear Lewis;

Special thanks for coming back so promptly with the descriptive
material. We are glad you are sticking to the novel. Aside from making
dummies, a piece of it isn t much good to us until we have it all In the
present congestion in manufacture, you have to speak ahead for linotype
machines and be sure that you have enough to keep them going on a job
when you start them on it. But you are doing finely. Keep it up!

How is Grace? I know that anybody who tries to live with you
would need a rest every so often.

We ll announce Main Street the first week in May.

Sincerely yours,
Alf

[1920] 27

May 5
Dear Lewis:

You will be glad to know we have just sold 1000 Free Air to Aus
tralia. The price is only 52 cents a copy, but there is a hundred odd
dollars in it for you and it means the beginning of your market there.
I hope nothing is hindering Main Street.

Sincerely yours,
Alf

Washington, May 8
Dear Alf:

Mighty glad to hear of the Australian sale. No; nothing is hindering
Main Street. For example, yesterday, when I drove 190 miles to Berry -
ville, Va. and back, was the first day I d taken off in eleven days; even
last Sunday I worked till 5:30 P.M. Fm revising with the most minute
care and, I fancy, with success.

Why shouldn t Main Street, as an unusually factual picture of Amer
ican life, go well in England? thus both increasing our return and getting
that important come-back from England which seems so much to impress
America? I wish you d plan to send over proofs for consideration by
English publishers as soon as you have them. I haven t the contract here
in niy office, but you and I share on English rights, don t we? If we don t,
go ahead and we *will share em, anyway.

. There is a little, uh, a small matter ... do I seem once or twice to
have murmured of a certain matter a man named Hoyns, connected, if
I remember, with a firm of waste-paper dealers in Franklin Square, who
has the paper-rights to certain earlier compendia of mine? Do you seem
to Oh the hell you don t.

As ever,
si

May to
Dear Lewis:

We have been trying Free Air in England and Herbert Jenkins just
offers us $3 1 6 for a duplicate set of plates for the British market outside of
Canada, free from royalty. The one Australian order is worth more than
that, and I expect we shall tell them to go to. We ll see what they say to
Main Street.

Hoyns is in England. I ll get to him before we publish Main Street.

Sincerely yours,
Alf

28 MAIN STREET

Washington, Friday

Dear Alf :

Yes, I think I should tell Jenkins to go to the devil with his offer of
$316. Perhaps after Main Street we can do better.

When you get to Hoyns and talking buying books, don t you think
it would be much better to leave out The Innoccnts-not take it over at
all or, if you have to take it with the rest, not rcpublish it? The general
opinion seems to be very strongly that it is too sentimental to be in agree
ment with the other books, and republishing it might do more harm than
good.

I had lunch with Fred Howe, the Heywood Brouns, and the Gilson
Gardners today. Mrs. Gardner is, you probably know, one of the three
proprietors of the excellent small Wayfarers Bookshop here. She is wore
than disposed to be friendly to all Harcourt books. They have sold more
than 400 Keynes. She volunteered quite without the slightest suggestion
from anybody else-this important criticism. I think I can give it pretty-
nearly in her words: "There s one thing that HBH must do-they must
vary the jackets of their serious books more. Using that same gray and
the same general sort of make-up, they all look alike,"

I remember as a book reviewer having the same feeling about the
jackets of non-fiction books of Putnam and Macmillan-their similarity,
whereby no new interest was, at first glimpse, aroused by a new book*
Lay out a bunch of your non-fiction books and look at em together and
think this over. Mrs. G. is fairly intelligent and may be rite.

SL

May 17
Dear Lewis:

Thanks for yours of Friday. As to Main Street: Gehrs and Don are
crying for material for a dummy, and I guess you had better let us have
something. Do you see it with a picture jacket, or a serious-looking one
like a Bennett or Wells novel, or a cross between the two, whatever that
may be? I confess it hasn t come clear in my mind, and I d like your
suggestions. We could do a line drawing somewhere on it,

As to jackets in general: there is a gap between the Knopf splashes
and our two or three sorts for non-fiction, There is an advantage in hav
ing a book of ours generally recognized for its jacket the way Macmillan s
and Doran s are. There is a great advantage, when paper orders are ac
cepted subject to three months delay, in being able to buy considerable
supplies of jacket paper, rather than having to hunt around for odd quan
tities of odd colors. We shall treat each novel differently, at any rate, and

[1920] 29

of course we shall not be publishing quite so damn much non-fiction after
we have hit the public in the eye with this spring s bunch.

All right, we won t buy The Innocents unless it won t cost us any
more to get it than to leave it out.

Sincerely yours,
Alf

Washington, May 19
Dear Alf:

For Main Street jacket, I think perhaps a type-jacket, with a small
pen-and-ink sidewise-panel picture of a real Middlewestern Main Street
would be best. It must not be humorous or cartoon-y. I enclose a layout
for one, with text and make-up; and also enclose a memo for the artist,

I m not satisfied with the text as I give it on the jacket. Change it as
much as you wish, or can it entirely or use it if you do like it. I ve tried
to get into it an idea of the book as a dignified and serious production,
with reality & drama both in it.

I am working right up to my final limit; and I am doing nothing but
Main Street. But even so I m not at all sure that I shall have it entirely
done before July ist. It s a damn long and detailed job, and requires un
ending care. I can however let you have 100,000 words all ready to print
by June ist, if you need it.

As ever,
si

May 21
Dear Lewis:

I am going to answer your letter about jacket, etc. since these matters
fall within my particular province. We should like to go ahead at once to
prepare a thin dummy. For this we shall want enough manuscript to set
up 32 pages 10,000 words should be enough for this.

We had a session this morning over the jacket. What we are chiefly
interested in is a jacket that will sell the book to the limit, but none of us
feels that your layout is the best we can do from this point of view. Of
course we want the book to look dignified and serious, but not too dig
nified and serious. We do not want to suggest that it has something to do
with travel or that it is a small-town study. The main emphasis, I think,
should be on the story something quite different from Free Air. I haven t
a plan in mind that is concrete enough to sketch out, but I would like to
talk the thing over with an artist and let him make some sketches and see

30 MAIN STREET

what happens. The material you have sent will certainly be helpful. My
hope is that among us all we may evolve a jacket that will be a wonder.

Faithfully yours,
Don

Washington, May 22
Dear Don:

In reply to yours of yesterday, I am sending herewith 90 pages-
about 27,000 words of the Main Street ms, together with the introduc
tory matter. It s all ready to print. The estimate for the entire length of
the book is 176,000 words, and this has been made very carefully ought
to be pretty close.

About the jacket go to it! Change my plan as much as you like, or
can it entirely. One idea for picture would be the girl staring in despair
at stupid village street, of the straight, harsh, Midwestern kind 1 speak of
in my memo for artist* Or she might be facing, rather scared by, a group
of stodgy, stupid, small-town people ready to struggle against them, But
it MUST NOT be a love-story-romance-pretty-girl typical jacket, or it will
lose the appeal to precisely the people most likely to be interested in this
novel. How about a decoration rather than a straight picture an effective
Franklin Booth pen-and-ink, or the kind of decorations this chap Guern
sey Moore often does for articles in the Sat Even Post? Anyway, good
luck!

Sinclair Lewis

Washington, Saturday
Dear Alf :

In a few days you or her as takes in packageswill receive a huge
bundle from me, by express. It contains manuscripts and magazine-copies
of short stories I have written. I have been holding them against the day
when I should be ready to select from them for one or more books of
short stories.

Would it be improper to ask you to store that bundle away some
where till we re both ready (if ever!) to think about the matter of a book
of short stories? There s so many of them now that I can t cany them
round any longer, and if I stored them in an ordinary way, it would be
hard to get hold of them if we did want them.

Zever,
si

[ 1920] 3 1

The lease was up June ist on the ho^lse the Lewises had rented, Lewis
moved to a new address in Washington where he planned to stay until
the book was done > while Mrs. Lewis went to Virginia.

(New address, June i to July i:)
1127 Seventeenth Street, N.W.,
Washington, D.C.
Monday, May 31

Dear Don:

Both Grace and I are wildly enthusiastic about the sketch for the
jacket. It s just right; I m sure it s just the thing tt>sell the book; both
dignified and interesting. And we like the shelf -back as much as the front.

I can t tell what the artist plans to do with the figure. If it weren t
for the position of the girl s feet, I d think she was back-to-us, looking at
the street. And why wouldn t that be a good, and somewhat original, way
to have her-instead of having her face us, have her back to us, as she
looks at the street, and possibly instead of working out any details or
costume, have her in complete silhouette.

The figure should be slender and smart, as now. But she should not
have the little purse she now carries. Carol would not have one. She
would either have nothing in her hand-or she might be carrying an over
night bag, which would indicate that she had just come from the train
and was having her first glimpse of Main Street, thus suggesting the story.

I can t tell but I think the artist means to have Roseb Movie on the
sign on the right-as a part of the sign Rosebud Movie Palace. But it also
looks like Rose* Movie. It should be Roseb or Rosebud.

I m very much excited about the jacket, and very much pleased. In
letter-press on back or flap you mite use the subtitle, "The Story of Carol
Kennicott," to give hint that this is a story, & possibly use w. my name,
"Author of The Job" Please give my congratulations to the artist-don t

know who he is.

S Lewis

June i

Dear Lewis: . .

I am delighted with your enthusiasm about the jacket. I think it is an
unusually striking composition of color and design. The fact that you
couldn t tell whether the girl was coming or going reflects her hesitation
on that point. She was waiting in the sketch for us to make up our mind.
The artist will go ahead and place her back to the audience. She mustn t

32 MAIN STREET

carry an overnight bag, however, because she went from the station in an
automobile and went out afterwards to see the town. You see I have read
the part of the manuscript you sent on, although I reali /cd this was an
unconventional thing for me to do.

Faithfully yours,
Don

Washington, Tuesday
Dear Alf :

Terribly glad you like the first 90 pages. Of one thing I am dead sure,
both from my own revising and from Grace s remarks: the book steadily
gets better as it goes on, and the last 200 pages will be much the best of
all, which is, I think a good thing people are attracted by the first part
but they are held, they are made to commend a book, by the last part.

si

Washington, Wednesday
Dear Alf:

Here s another note characteristically modest! It is NOT intended to
run as-is, but to form the basis for one or two or three publicity notes or
advertising or catalogue spiels,

It probably would best be broken into two different notes: one about
this-here author and how he got his material (and to that can be added
matter about The Job, Our Mr. Wrenn, etc), and the other a challenging,
attention-rousing, tho possibly trouble-making suggestion that Mx\ Lewis
does not find all beautiful and perfect in Red-blooded Small-town Amer
icanism. I don t think it would hurt to let a hint of this critical attitude
slip out; it would stir more eagerness than a supposition that (like all the
rest save Sherwood Anderson) Mr. Lewis purrs over the American village
as being God s own particular residence. Just as it is Kcyncs s criticism
that makes his book go.

Grace is also writing some notes, which I ll send when I gctum,

Zever,
si

Washington, Wednesday, July 7
Dear Alf:

Thanks a lot for sending me the new P.W. (Publishers Weekly) ad
much impressed and delighted by it. ... Wouldn t it be a good thing

[1920] 33

in future ads to mention fact that the book will NOT be, in any part, in
any magazine, or will the travelers sufficiently convey that?

I ll be all through and shoot you in the complete ms in eight or ten
days. Since I last saw you, in April wasn t it, I haven t stopped for a
minute been doing nothing but work on Main Street. Last night I worked
till ten minutes after midnight! Grace is down country, but I ve stayed
here soz to work uninterrupted. My Gawd how much work there has
beenhow it has gone on, even tho I ve tried to hurry. Done my damnd
est to get it down before but cdn t without scamping the work. But now
week or week and a half more is all, and I m at it night and day.

Hope you will be in NY middle and end of next week so you ll get
it. Will try to come up so that we can take up together any changes if
any changes or cuts should be necessary. If you re out of NY but not too
far away cd perhaps come to you.

I m going to ask you for an advance of $500. Working on this so
long about eight solid months * with prices what they have been, I m
almost entirely broke.

In haste,

rf

* 8 months since mid of last November, to say nothing of 2 or 3 months
in previous years & efforts to get started.

JulyS
Dear Lewis:

After I saw the advertisement in print in the Publishers Weekly, I
wished I had said that the book had not been offered for serialization any
where, but the travelers are pounding that fact, and we shall say it in the
next ad.

Your suggestion is just what I had hoped for, that we could have a
day or two together after the manuscript is finished. I would like twenty-
four quiet hours with it before I talk to you about it. I expect to be here
right along* Hastings is off to camp, my mother off to the country, and
we have room for you in the house at Mount Vernon.
Here is the check for $500. You deserve it.

Ever yours,
Alf

Washington, Friday
Dear Alf:

You re a wonder! That check so quickly! See you P.D.Q.

si

34 MAIN STREET

Lewis came to New York from Washington on Saturday, July ijth, with
the complete manuscript. Harcourt read it over the weekend and they
discussed changes and deletions at his home in Mount Vernon, The dis
cussions ended to their complete satisfaction, with Lewis making only
minor alterations,

Kennebago Lake House,
Kennebago Lake, Maine
July 27
Dear Don:

Here she is-the last thirty pages of Main Street-thank the Lord,
Now to go fishing! It s about perfect here-lakes, pines, birches, moun
tains, cold nights.

Will you please tell Miss Eayrs that I ll be writing her some publicity
notes P.D.Q.? And will you please ask her if she hasn t that photograph
showing me sitting at a table with typewriter, cigarettes, etc. In some
ways it s the best one I ve ever had.

As ever,
Sinclair Le*ivis

Kennebago Lake, August 1 1
Dear Alf :

There s several things I ve been thinking of that I want to take up

with you. ^, v-w>r , ,

J Claude Washbum

I spoke to you about a new novel, Order, by Claude Washbum, pub
lished by Duffield. Washbum has ability and should grow considerably.
He s really on the job now after some years of rather taking it easy in
Italy. I have here a letter from him in which he expresses dissatisfaction
with Duffield. He has finished about 2/3 of a new novel, 1 apparently
much his biggest one. Will you do this: write him inviting him to send
in what he has done (this is his suggestion). This looks to me like the
possibility of annexing a real fiction writer, and you won t be tying your
self up at all.

Letter to critics

I ve thought (and rather worried) a lot about the problem of the
real critics assuming that Main Street is another Free Air and not really
reading it, or giving it to assistants. I wish that in a week or two you
would write to some or all of the following a letter (form letter with a
personal paragraph, perhaps) something to this effect: The last two novels

1 The Lonely Warrior, HB&Co., 1922.

[1920] 35

by Lewis, Innocents and Free Air, have been but interludes during the
planning of Main Street, and the actual work on it has taken most of the
last two years. I presume that you like his The Job. Well, this is much
bigger than The Job just as true and much better done. It is almost the
first book which really pictures American small-town life. It has not been
pub. in or offered to any magazine. I m writing you about it beforehand
in the hope that when it comes you will be able to give it your personal
attention. Something like that to: Henry Mencken, Hackett or Lippmann
on New Republic, Van Wyck Brooks on the Freeman, Floyd Dell on the
Liberator, Heywood Broun on N.Y. Tribune, Mrs. Dawson on the. Globe,
Ben6t on NYEvening Post, Franklin P. Adams on Tribune (BE SURE SEND
HIM A COPY), Christopher Morley on NYEvening Post, O.O.McIntyre,
who does a colyum syndicated thru US, Wilson Follett, Lawrence Gil-
man, William Lyon Phelps, Stuart Sherman. AND any other really impor
tant critics you can think of.

I think that such a letter a short, tactful one, interesting yet devoid
of superlativeswould be of importance in counteracting the danger of
this being neglected as another magaziney tale. Couldn t Spingarn if he
reads the proofs and likes the book write some of these letters to the
critics and sign them himself, perhaps?

Publicity Notes

Why don t you save yourself and Miss Eayrs the task of writing
publicity notes (and occasionally Planting a Story) by having some
trained publicity man or woman do it on the side? And it does take special
training such as having been on a newspaper. Most publishers fall down
in doing publicity because, however fine and full their training as pub
lishers, they ve never had that newspaper experience which is the one
basis of getting publicity. Thass all!

As ever,

August 14
Dear Lewis:

Thanks for yours of the nth. I am glad to notice that you date it.
I had to go back through your letters the other day to look up something.
Something like "Thursday" is all you indulge in. Of course I am interested
in Claude Washburn. I have written to him. Thank you.

The sort of letter you mention for critics will go, of course, except
that I have made a point of running into a number of them, and doing

36 MAIN STREET

part of it by word of mouth. I know I have Heywood Broun and the Post
folks primed for it in that way,

We do have some trained people to do special publicity. You know
I don t believe much in the John-Hobank-h^-stubbed-his-third-toe-and-
so-can t-finish-his-new-novel-until-Thursday sort of publicity, and thank
heaven you don t either.

Have you become an earnest fisherman?

Ever yours,
Atf

(Undated)
Dear Alf :

I think the title of the next gt. realistic not-to-be-serializcd nov. by
Mr. Sinclair Lewis, which ll be the story of the Tired Business Man, of
the man in the Pullman smoker, of our American ruler, of the man play
ing golf at the country club at Minneapolis, Omaha, Atlanta, Rochester,
will be the name of the central character, and that name, and title, will be
(I think): PUMPHREY. How does it strike you? Doesn t it delineate the
man to you? And titles that arc names are rather successful in sticking in
mind, for example: Clayhanger^ Mary Olivier^ Kip[>$ 9 McTcafftic, Rthati
Frome, Adam 3ede, Silas Mamcr, Nicholas Nicklcby, David Copperfield)
Mile. Maupin, Madame It ovary, pretty good precedents, don t you think.
G, T. Pumphrey, of Monarch City, . , .
Like it?

And it will be done
Oh, Gawd!

As ever,
rf

Lewis and his wife stayed at Kennebago Lake through September pth,
arriving in New York on Friday, the loth. For several weeks they re
mained in New York at the Manhattan Sq tmre Hotel Mrs. Lewis, how
ever, went to Washington house-hunting and rejoined Lewis in New
York -for about a week before their departure for Washington on October
ijth. Main Street was published on the

TWO

Publication and Success

[1920]

1639 1 9th St., NW.
Washington, D.C
Thursday Oct. 2 1
Dear Alf ;

Lord it s beautiful-the three, to date, F.P.A. boosts, and the Broun
review! I m terribly glad. Bully letter from Cabell-seems to like the book
a lot and says he s proud to be in the dedication. 1

And, with just-reed check from Post for story sold while I was in
NY, Lorimer has raised my price per story from $900 to $1000, so every
thing flourishes.

I snook secretively into Brcntano s here yesterday and noted they
still had a pile of about 15 Free Airs. Hope to Gawd they get rid of them,
and hope there s not many other stores still heavily stocked therewith, or
naturally it ll cramp their enthusiasm for Main Street. Perhaps M St will
also start up Free Air again. In fact: @$"?%* W (#;;)$*-/%*M- as Guy
Pollock so well says in that brilliant new book Main Street, which you
really must read.

si

In the early days Harcourt often wrote to Lewis by hand or from home,
and there are no copies of many of his letters. However, Lewfs refer
ences to them often supply continuity.

Washington, October 25
Dear Alf:

You know how glad I am of the news that calls for M St have been
such that you ve had to reprint. Have you ever talked to Robert Bench-
ley about it, for the World?

1 Lewis dedicated Main Street to James Branch Cabell and Joseph Hergesheimer,

38 MAIN STREET

This letter is about three possible Harcourt authors:

Arthur IBullard

Author of A MLxrls World and Comrade Yetta (both admirable
novels), The Stranger, recent and pretty good: books on Morocco,
Panama, and Russia, all published by Macmillan. He lives here in Wash
ington, and I was sounding him out the other clay. He is, I m sorry to
say, of the Cadet faction regarding Russia, which shows poor judgment;
and certainly his recent novel hasn t shown any increased skill. So he s
by no means a certain bet.

Arthur D. Call

Brother-in-law of George Soule. Secretary of the American Peace
Society, Washington, and editor of The Advocate of Peace. He has a
series of ten articles on the idea that the recent war has not destroyed the
peace movement which would make a book at least worth considering.

Gene McCo?nas

There is, in California, a girl who, if she would, could write as well
as Joe Hcrgesheimer: Mrs, Francis McComas, wife of a water-eolorist
well known on the Pacific Coast. She s young probably 32; father editor
of an Oakland, Calif, paper; when he died, she had to leave art school and
go to work on Oakland paper; since her marriage has gone back to paint
ing. That s why she hasn t written more has taken it out in painting. But
like many others Hergcsheimer, Yeats, Robt Chambers I expect her to
turn from one kind of color to the other some day.

I judge her great ability by her letters. Ordinarily of course that s a
deceptive basis of judgment but so remarkable is her sense of color in
words, so brilliant her phrasing, so distinguished her taste, so illuminating
her bits of scenes, so fascinated her interest in everything from smart
parties at Del Monte to Jap fisher boats wrecked on the beach, that I
know what she can do. She declares that she has no sense of plot; I ve
given her hell many times but with no result. I m quite sure that a letter
from the great publisher would stir her where I couldn t.

So!
Sinclair Lewis

Washington, Wednesday, October 27
Dear Alf :

Letter this morning from John Peter Toohey, theatrical press agent
who writes many stories for Sat Even Post, but a man I ve never met or

[1920] 39

had correspondence with or know anything about. He says, among other
things: "I lay in bed this morning until 1:15 reading Main Street and if
it isn t the best novel written in these United States in a decade Fll eat my
hat. Fve just written Harry Mencken to go out and grab a copy instanter
and Fm calling Booth Tarkington s attention to it in a letter which I am
sending him."

IVe thanked him and suggested that perhaps you may call him
up. My idea is this: Perhaps, IF Tark likes it, you can get, through Mr.
Toohey, a boost from Tark quotable in ads. Mencken we d better let
alone he ll be getting touchy.

Hope all goes gloriously.

As ever,

si

Have qualms about name Pumphrey now too English and mite be
thought humorous. But I think I shall use for next novel s title a man s
name, standing alone Pumphrey or some other name.

October 27
Dear Lewis:

I enclose the Heywood Broun part of this morning s Tribune. It is
intensely interesting, and of course a good thing from every point of
view, 1 This letter is to say it is my judgment that you would be very
unwise to answer it yourself. Somebody else will, and the thing to do is
to get as many people as possible passing it back and forth, without your
coming in to settle it. Forgive all this present tense, imperative mode about
what is after all your business.

Yours,
Alf

Washington, Thur. Oct 28
Dear Alf:

Your special delivery letter came last evening. No indeed, I shan t
answer the Floyd Dell comments in the Tribune shan t even comment.
The Dell discussion is stimulating & Tm glad of it.

As ever,
SL

1 Refers to a controversy in the New York Tribune in which Heywood Broun
answered Floyd Dell s attack on Main Street.

40 MAIN STREET

October 29

Dear Lewis:

The letters from Toohey and Flandrau are bully and very useful.
Pass on anything else of the sort you get, I am using them in a letter to
the trade, and if they pile up enough, we can get permission to use them
in public advertising.

We have orders for a thousand out of the next edition which will be

in the first of the week.

Sincerely yours,

Alf

Washington, October 30

Dear Alf:

Wonderful letter from Philip Curtiss! Thank you very much for
sending it to me. Doesn t Curtiss live in Hartford, at least part of the
time? Couldn t you get him to review M St for Hartford paper? Would
be marvelous to quote.

Mencken likes it. John Peter Toohey writes me that Mencken wrote
him, "I have read Main Street from end to end and with great joy, It is,
as you say, a fine piece of work. It seems to me that his quotations from
the Gopher Prairie Dauntless are even better than his conversations."
Then, today, comes a voluntary letter from Mencken to me saying, "I
hasten to offer my congratulations. Main Street is a sound and excellent
piece of workrite best thing of its sort that has been done so far. More,
I believe it will sell. I ll review it in the January Smart Set, the first issue
still open."

Luck!

As ever,
si

Washington, Monday Nov. i
Dear Alf:

Delighted to know of orders against second printing. Like your letter
to the trade extremely. My only criticism is that I d quote the Flandrau
letter differently in case you use it again. There may some time be a
place for the longer version, and it s good to get in the "no volume lias
gone deeper" unless it s too superlative. I d quote most of the last para
graph in Curtiss s letter about "may not seem of calibre of Anna Karen-
ma, but I know of no more delicate scene in literature" etc.

[1920] 41

Do you know anybody who is in touch with W. L. George? He s
beginning to air his newly formed opinions on American novels. Wouldn t
it be highly advisable to get a Main Street through to him in some per
sonal sort of way, and get him to read it while he s lecturing and being
interviewed all round?

As ever,
si

November 4
Dear Lewis:

I have seen Mr. Call. Nothing in it for us yet. I shan t bother about
Arthur Bullard or Gene McComas. Bullard has gone too far without really
doing anything, and life is too short for the other.

I like the idea of "a man s name" for the next novel, but not any
queer-sounding name like Pumphrey. Get a name like Main Street.

Henry Forman has been in and given us some winged words that we
can quote. Note the fit that Lewisohn throws in this week s Nation, and
even the respectful consideration in the Weekly Review.

Sincerely yours,
Alf

Nov. 6
Dear Lewis:

Philadelphia North American had a decent review this morning, and
Chicago Daily News a perfunctory one last Wednesday, It s curious that
the sophisticated Tribune folks, and a real critic like Lewisohn see the
greatness of the book while the provinces like it but lack the nerve or the
sense. Not so curious after all, just too bad. Not that these reviews are in
any sense slams. I suppose I want everybody on his hind legs about it and
nothing less.

Yours,
A.H.

November 6
Dear Lewis:

I am sending you an advance copy of Jacob Wassermann s The
World s Illusion. Since Spingarn has read Main Street, he is not so sure

42 MAIN STREET

that The World s Illusion is the most distinguished work we are pub
lishing. What do you think?

Yours,
Alf

Washington, November 1 1
Dear Alf:

The Nation review is tremendous! Did you see Robert Benchlcy s
review in the NY World for Monday?

About the next novel. We ought to be thinking of it before too long,
Mustn t let too long a time elapse between M St and next. The principal
problem will be to finance it. About that we ll know more by next May,
say; but I wish you d keep it in mind. . . . I m busy making many notes
for it

Pumphrey, you say, is too freakish a name. I don t think, the, that
the title name ought to be too common-like Jones, Smith, Robertson,
Thompson, Brown, Johnson for the reason that then people will asso
ciate the name not with the novel but with their numerous acquaintances
who have that common name. What do you think of the following:
BURGESS-BABIHTT--HORNBY or some name of that typenormal, yet not
too common?

A New Haven friend writes me that Prof. Billy Phclps is enthusiastic.
Did you send a copy to Prof. Stuart Sherman? Might be worth while?

As ever,
rf

Nov. n
Dear Lewis:

I wish we could have another hefty novel next fall, but Ftl rather
have it much later than not to have it of real heft, and of course so would
you. "Burgess" is a good name,

I ve just read Zona Gale s Lulu Bctt; it s a clean tight job, should
interest you for the sheer economy of words to get the effect, but it
doesn t hold a candle to Main Street.

Yours much,
Alf

[1920] 43

Washington, Nov. 11
Dear Alf :

Would it maybe be wise to send a copy of the Nation review to
H. G. Wells, Bernard Shaw, Galsworthy, Conrad, Geo Moore, Walpole,
Compton Mackenzie, W. L. George, Arnold Bennett, Edmund Gosse,
Leonard Merrick, Thomas Hardy, Edith Wharton, with a letter:

We fancy that you are interested in the advance of American fiction.
Doesn t the enclosed review indicate to you the rise of a new and authentic
interpreter of America? The New York Nation, under its present eager and
international-minded editorship, is of somewhat more than respectable judg
mentand it has never, so far as we know, shown quite such enthusiasm for
a novel as it has for Main Street.

Have you a copy of the book? Would you like one? If you will send us a
Yes on a card, we shall hasten to send you one. We believe that in it you will
find expressed, honestly, observantly, without the tabu of the old tribal for
mulae, the real America of today Middlewestern villages and farms, business
men, restless women.

We admit that we have a crafty hope that you may perhaps be moved to
send us a sentence of approbation, inasmuch as your verdict means so very
much to America, but we promise not to pursue you with further requests for
such an opinion unless you feel really like volunteering it.

Would you like a copy?

Might something like that flush a covey, possibly? I dunno. 7f you
got anything, could also be used in selling edition to England. I include
WLGeorge and Walpole with the bunch, despite the fact that they ve
had copies, because I suspect they re getting American novels in piles,
and tend not to read em. For Edith Wharton, being American, partly
American maybe, the letter might have to be changedbut not so much,
not so much!

Thrilled over the tidings of the melting of the second printing.
Could you get Mencken to give you one quotable sentence in anticipa
tion of his review? If you happened to run into him, you might be able
diplomatically to approach the matter.

As ever,

si

P.S, IF you want to do this, and IF any of the authors do send for the
book, I think you could properly, despite promise not to pursue them,
send with the book a note to remind them of what we want:

As we promised, we shall not pursue you for an opinion on Main Street,
but if you do by any chance feel moved to send us one voluntarily, it will be
of invaluable assistance in our none-too-easy task of persuading America that
this is a book worthy of its earnest interest.

44 MAIN STREET

P.P.S. I suggest sending the Nation review, instead of a book, first, be
cause thus, if they do answer, you can be sure of some interest on their
parts when the book arrives. And copies of the Nation are cheaper than
books for the experimentas experiment it would be.

Washington, Nov. i z
Dear Alf :

You speak of your wish for hefty novel next fall. Gocl, I wish so, too!
It s purely a matter of financing. If I had the money I d be working on it
right now tho indeed I am making notes, lots of them daily* The devil
of it is that it will take about one full year from the time I start the actual
writing of the book to the time when, with proofs and manufacture all
over, it can actually be published. I don t see how I can begin that writing
till next spring, at the earliest, which means publication in spring of 1922,
at the earliest. And, double damn it, with the need of getting ahead, I
don t even know that I can start it next spring. But of course there arc
three possibilities for financing aside from HJJ.&H. making me a guar
antee. Those are: Main Street may really make some money. "Willow
Walk" x may go as a movie. The musical comedy may go over, We ll
probably have to postpone Europe some more!

When I do the next one, it will be at least as good as Main Street,
I think it will be better. I think the central character will bulk larger than
Carol. And all details will be done with at least equal care. And it will NOT
be serializedat least not in any magazine with a large circulation, and
probably not in any at all.

Some time this winter I m going to some Midwestern city say Cin
cinnati or Dayton or Milwaukeeand complete the material for the next
novel which I made a good beginning of gathering in Minneapolis, St.
Paul, Seattle, San Francisco, New Haven, Washington. , . . I want to
make my city of 300,000 just as real and definitive in the novel as I made,
or tried to make, Gopher Prairie.

si

Wash n, Nov. 1 3
Dear Alf:

Hope orders have now justified printing of 3d edition. Some blow
out in the Tribune yesterday. Isn t it getting to be time that somebody
gently answered Floyd -Dell, or everybody will be saying that I ve been
unfair. I shan t answer, but I wonder if you couldn t get somebody to

1 Short story by Lewis published in the Saturday Evening Post, August to, 1918.

[1920] 45

say John Peter Toohey, Philip Curtiss, or somebody you know person
ally? If so, couldn t you send em a copy of the following, announcing
that you do NOT wish to influence unduly, but that it does represent our
attitude:

Why this controversy as to the attitudes of Felix Fay in Moon-Calf and
Carol in Main Street toward small towns toward American life? The answer
is so simple! Felix really is Floyd Dell, and therefore, since Mr. Dell is a gen
ius, since he is introspective and creative, would be about equally happy or
unhappy on Main Street or in the Quartier Latin. Whereas Carol Kennicott
distinctly is not Sinclair Lewis. She is, as Mr. Lewis specifically states, a small
town woman, differing from other small-town women only in being more
sensitive and articulate. Another thing: Felix is young, detached, and he is a
male. He can work in factories, go to beer-flowing picnics, be ardent at so
cialist locals. But Carol, wife of the country doctor, watched, criticized, could
do none of those things without a courage so extraordinary that it would make
her not a small-town woman but an Ellen Key. 1 Indeed in one paragraph she
is presented as wishing that she could do just the sort of thing Felix does work
in the mill. Finally, though he is born in a village, Felix spends years in a town
of 30,000, with half a dozen philosophers and poets. Half a dozen confidants
are as good as half a thousand. But in her prairie town of 3000, Carol hasn t
even one and it may be said that there are ten or twenty thousand Carols in
this country who would be amply content, for all their lives, if they could have
merely the half dozen that Felix does have.

Wouldn t that be worth while-if you can ethically and worthily plant
it? It is, if I am not mistaken, both true and pertinent.

As ever,
si

Washington, Nov. 17

Dear Alf :

I strolled through Brentano s, Pearlman s, and Ballantyne s, this after
noon. I couldn t, of course, examine minutely, but I looked about pretty
well, and the Main Street jacket does beautifully stand out. Well, I
couldn t see a single copy in either Ballantyne s or Pearlman s, and in
Brentano s only two copies, which were stuck away on a shelf under a,
counter. Of course you can tell more in one minute from order sheets
than I could from a hundred snooping trips. I know there s nothing these
damned authors do oftener than complain that their bally masterpieces
aren t being done-right-by in local bookstores, and I make this report for
what little value it may have.

* Swedish feminist and writer.

46 MAIN STREET

Thanks a lot for copy of letter to Columbia re Pulitzer Prize, for
having thought of submitting M St for the pme, and for note about 3d
printing. I don t see how a publisher could possibly get behind a book
more actively and more intelligently than H B & H have behind M St!

As ever,
si

November 18
Dear Lewis:

We thought there had probably been enough stir in Washington by
this time. They ll get the reaction from New York presently, surely by
the first of December when Congress assembles. The book is reiilly selling
in New York City, Baker and Taylor take another thousand, which just
cleans out the second printing. In fact, we are not filling the entire order
at once so as to be sure to have stock until we get the third lot next week.
We have bought a piece of paper which will print 6000 more as soon as
the third lot is off press. When that paper is used up, it will mean a total
of 26,000. All this gives us some real money to spend on our advertising
scheme.

Yours,
Alf

Washington, Nov. 10
Dear Alf:

Prof. Wm Lyon Phelps lectured here last night. He says that he is
going to speak extensively of Main Street in his lectures in Philadelphia,
Bridgeport, and New Haven, and that he will urge his audiences (which
run about 800, largely women) to buy the book, Gus might tell this to
buyers from those three cities, if he sees them or is writing them, Prof.
Phelps said to me, "1920 is an extraordinary year in American fiction.
There hasn t been another with so many good novels for many, many
years. And the three outstanding books-thc three on which I shall spe
cialize in lectures-are The Age of Innocence, Main Street & Mm Lulu
Bett.

I enclose letter from George Doran. As The Young Visitors l was
presented here in play form this week, and was excellent, I wrote him
about it suggesting publicity stunts, hence his letter. (Also I think that

1 A novel by Daisy Ashford, a nine-year-old English girl, which caused a sensa
tion when J. M. Barrie, who had written the introduction, was accused of being the
author.

[1920] 47

any pleasant relations between HBH and GHD are worth while, and I
contribute as a humble member of the firm of HBH.)

So!
si

Washington, Nov. 20
Dear Alf :

Bully ad, the big one for the Times for a week from now. Have
bought Miss Lulu Bett and will read it. My first impression is of the
horribleness of the jacket. Mighty glad you insisted on full picture for
front of Main St jacket.

The name of the next novel will be, I think: FITCH. The name of the
central character will be Jefferson Fitch. I blieve it combines normality
with sufficient distinctiveness to be remembered; it sounds as American
as John Brown. How do you like it especially after a day or two?

si

Washington, November 24
Dear Alf:

If you wanted to, I think you could get a line from Edna Ferber
about M St nice letter from her but nothing that can be detached for
quotation. Same about Charles G. Norris, author of Salt.

Carl Van Doren writes me that he heard a Columbia instructor or
professor "arguing with a whole gang of men at luncheon that Main
Street is the most truthful novel ever written." If you run into Van Doren,
or call him up, why don t you find out who said that; possibly get said
unknown to write twenty words to that effect though of course he may
not yet be sufficiently advanced on the academic ladder so that the Dear
Readers will listen to him.

Zasall!
rf

Washington, November 26

Dear Alf:

CHEERS! An unsolicited letter from Galsworthy, apparently out west
lecturing. It runs as follows: ". . . I am an ignorant person, but it seems
to me that so wholesome and faithful a satiric attitude of mind has been
rather conspicuously absent from American thought and literature. . . .
It s altogether a brilliant piece of work and characterisation. My hearty

48 MAIN STREET

congratulations. Every country, of course, has its Main Streets, all richly
deserving of diagnosis, but America is lucky to have found in you so
poignant and just and stimulating a diagnostician. ."

I should imagine from the friendliness of this that you might be able
to get him to write for you something to be used in advertising etc., or
get him to let you use sentences from the letter, or both. It does seem to
me that Galsworthy s undoubted fame and reputation for sheer honesty
would make this worth while.

Lewis Galantierc, an intelligent chap I know here in Washington,
friend to Sherwood Anderson, Guy Holt, Burton Rascoe, ct al., is going
to France, to be stationed there on a bvisiness mission. He insists that Main
Street must be translated into French. He seems to know something of
French publishers and of the proper approach. He is a fine lad and I have
given him a card to Spingarn so that he may talk over this with him.

Corking, 17,000 already. Well get that 100,000.

Thaznuff
si

Washington, November 27
Dear Alf :

Here s something possibly even better than the John Galsworthy
letter the enclosed editorial on Main Street by William Allen White
because Middle America knows White and knows that he knows the
Middlewest. It can t be said of him, as it might of Galsworthy, "but he
is no judge of Main Street." In his letter Mr. White says: "Mrs. White
and I, reading aloud, have just finished Main Street, and I hasten to tell
you what a noble thing you have done. . . . With all my heart I thank
you for Will Kennicott and Sam Clark; they are the Gold Dust Twins of
common sense, I don t know where in literature you will find a better
American, or more typical, than Dr. Will Kennicott ... If I were a
millionaire, I should buy a thousand of those books and send them to my
friends and then I would go and bribe the legislature of Kansas to make
Main Street compulsory reading in the public schools. No American has
done a greater service for his country m any sort of literature than you
have done"

Mr, White says he wants to send out a number of M Sfs to various
friends with my name in them. For this, he sends a blank check to be sent
to you and by you filled out. (My God, what trust!) He says, "I want
to use your book for a Christmas present."

Wouldn t a copy of White s editorial and one of Galsworthy s letter
be very valuable things to send to the proper persons regarding the

[1920] 49

Pulitzer Novel Prize in addition to the clippings which, in your letter
to some Columbia professor, you said you were sending? White is known
as a fine upstanding American of great intelligence.

And wouldn t a copy of Galsworthy s letter be of value for trying
to sell a respectably large edition to the English publishers?

I am glad of the beautiful break on 2nd and 3rd printings. Do you
know, I think we ought all now to be expecting to sell not 40,000 alone
but actually 100,000! And I think we can do it! The book has just begun
to percolate outside of NY, and 15,000 are gone. Give us a year and a
quarter of pushing, and we ought to see 100,000 sale anyway which
would enable SL to write his next novel with clear sailing and then some,
and would, I hope, with costs slightly diminishing, give HBH a little
money to spare. Won t you talk that over with Gus, Don, et al. and see
if they don t think with me that there s a fine sailing wind for 100,000,
and reasons for working toward it? If this proves true, if the 3rd and 4th
printings go as the second have, pretty soon you ll have to begin to print
10,000 at a clip, don t you think?

In all the above I say "we" not "you," because I expect to do any
thing and everything I can to help. For one thing: As you remember, our
contract arrangement is that I am to receive 10% as long as active adver
tising goes on, then 15%, Well, I should quite serenely see myself receiv
ing only 10% all the way up to 100,000 if continued advertising will help
the sale of the book.

And if it s any help I ll keep up these profuse epistles, tho God
knoweth even to my naive authorship it occurs it may be that the one
thing I could do to help would be to relieve you of all this flood save
perhaps such items as the Galsworthy letter! But till I get beaten up, I go
on trustingly writing at length.

By the way, doesn t the Galsworthy letter suggest some merit in my
recently at4ength-outlined scheme to try to get comments from Wells,
Shaw, George, et al? You might well quote to them from the Galsworthy
letter! !

So! Off for 100,000! Alf, we ve got em all by the ears! Harcourt,
Boni, Knopf, Huebsch will dominate the publishing world and me oh
hell, I ll go home and read a book about real estate as preparation for

FITCH

by the author of Main Street

First printing:

50,000

si

50 MAIN STREET

November 27
Dear Lewis:

The Galsworthy letter is perfectly fine. The printings now ordered
total 32,000. It is not a question of printing 5000 or 10,000 according to
the sales you expect in quite the fashion which used to prevail when you
were in the publishing business. The way the paper market is, it is a ques
tion of picking up what you can find of the right size and weight, and
the odd numbers mean so many books according to the piece of paper.
As the paper market is falling a little, we don t want to load up with
heavy supplies at the top price, but keep just far enough ahead so that we
can surely keep our books in stock. Knopf is out of Moon-Cdf for two
weeks.

The letters went to the English authors with the Nation review, so
it is too late to send them a quotation from Galsworthy.

As you know, we thought of raising the price after the first edition.
Gus and Don and I have discussed it a good deal, have said 100,000 to
ourselves before you did, and don t feel like monkeying with the price at
least until the book gets all the legs under it that it will; say sometime
next year. What we are out to do on this book is to make you as an
author. We ll get a contribution to our overhead now and can take profits
next time or the time after that.

I suppose you realize the change that has come over your position as
a novelist because of the success this book has had and is going to have.
It is something like the change that has come over me as a publisher in
the last year because of the success this business has had, and I must give
you a tip out of my experience. There were a great many people who had
all the good wishes in the world for this enterprise, and to whom I could
spill my hopes and aspirations as frankly and freely as to you or to Don.
With success, that changes somewhat, and one has to stop wearing his
heart on his sleeve and play with the cards closer to his belt. I should
think that with an author whose fortune seems sometimes to depend a
good deal on the whim of the public, the jealousies that grow up arc apt
to be even more acute. You have now made a great success, and it is going
to be a good deal bigger, and so very early in the game when there is no
particular reason for saying it as far as you are concerned, I am giving
you this little lead out of my own experience with a warning to watch
your step in your letters, and perhaps most of all, watch from whom you
accept any favors.

Ever yours,
Alf

[1920] 51

Washington, November 29
Dear Alf :

The Main Street ad in the Sunday Times of yesterday is magnificent
simply leaps out of the page, indeed, leaps out of that whole magazine-
review-section, at the reader. It s one of the best book ads I ve ever seen;
one of the best examples of use of white space.

Bully letter, yours of Saturday. Your tip about not wearing my heart
on my sleeve, about being careful of letters and of alliances, is excellent
and shall be kept in mind. I m glad you gave it to me. It s the sort of point
of view to which, if it were not early suggested, one might win slowly
and by experience none too pleasant. I m awfully glad you-all see a pos
sible 100,000, as I do. I think you must know how much I appreciate your
faith and all the damn, straining, hustling attention to details you have
to give.

As ever,
si

Washington, November 30
Dear Alf:

I had hoped to be able to keep from doing it, but I m afraid I shall
have to ask you to let me have another $500 on Main Street royalties, and
P.D.Q. I received, this morning, a rejection of a story from the Post, and
on that story I had considerably counted to keep me going and a little
more. I shall send story to Harper s, but I can t bank on it, and meantime
the bank account is down to almost nothing.

I am, frankly, having a hell of a time in trying at once to turn myself
back into the successful S.E.P. writer I was a year ago and yet do for
them nothing but stories so honest that they will in no way get me back
into magazine trickiness nor injure the M St. furore. And so, three weeks
ago, I destroyed 60,000 words of just-finished copy which, with a couple
weeks revising, I m quite sure I could have sold to the Post for four or
five thousand dollars, but which was so shallow, so unreal, so sentimental
that (featured as they do feature a serial, even a short one) it would have
been very bad for Main Street. God knows I don t expect you to bear the
responsibility for this, which may have been foolhardy. I relate it only to
prove how vigorously I have been attacking this problem.

This torn up, I started the story they have just rejected. I tried to
make it a real story of business, and probably I fell between two stools.
Fortunately the third story, which I shall send the Post in a few days, is
of a romantic type, honestly written yet by its "go" almost certain to
attract them. But meanwhile I need five hundred a good deal damn it

52

MAIN STREET

had been hoping to leave all my royalties with you for use in the imme
diate needs of your business.

Of course one thing that complicates my magazine writing is that
all my keenest eagerest thought tends to sneak off into my plans, thoughts,
notes about Fitch-vshich will, I believe, correct any faults of "exterior
vision," of sacrifice of personality to types and environment, which in his
New Republic review Francis Hackett finds in Main Street.

Oh, I ll get along all right, without, I hope, too much leaning on you.
We re going to do, together, Alf, the biggest job of novelizing in the
country, and that I suppose naturally takes a little more sweat and worry
than smoothly issuing neat books. I m going, of course, to go on plugging
at the Post, but I don t believe I shall ever again be the facile Post trickster
I by God was for which, doubtless, we shall in the long run be glad.

Nice note from Fannie Hurst, whom IVe never met nor corresponded
with: "I am so deeply glad that Main Street has been said (and in what
masterly fashion!) that the impulse to write you simply will not be gain
said."

Heh-cha-cha, them kind words is all dissimilar to this morning s note
from Lorimer politely but firmly placing my short story back in papa s
hands b God.

si

December i
Dear Lewis:

Here is the check for $500 you ask for. Don & Spingarn and I have
talked the whole matter over, and your letter and our talk, and what has
happened to Main Street lead us to make the following proposal: Actual
sales of Main Street are within four or five hundred copies of 20,000. We
have contracted for within $300 of the advertising appropriation earned
by 20,000 copies, and copy I am sending off today will eat that up. You
know as well as we how good the prospects are for large sales the rest of
this year and on into next year. If you will consider the enclosed $500
check to cover January, we will agree to pay you out of royalties earned
$500 a month during 1921. I think we are running very little risk, but I
want to get the records clear. I hope that a balance will be built up so
that this arrangement or a modification of it will continue for a long time
and you can go ahead and write the novels that you ought to and want
to, but we are making the proposal only for the year 1921, and you
mustn t have any hard feelings if it should turn out to be for only 1921.

What I hope is that you can get a short story or two ahead of the

[1920] 53

game during December and that our guarantee will enable you to plan
your next year s life and work as you want to as a novelist. Let me know
what you think of all this.

Ever yours,
Alf

Washington, Dec. 3
Dear Alf:

I am, of course, immensely pleased by your offer of a guarantee of
$500 a month during 1921 (the $500 received to cover January), and I
am glad to accept it with the prayer and hope that it will be much more
than covered by the royalties, and that you will be taking no risk. . . .
If Main Street doesn t go the 100,000 we hope, it will, I think, go forty or
fifty thousand for a minimum.

What I plan to do is this: Keep plugging at short stories till some
time in, say, March, getting four or five or six thousand ahead over and
above the guarantee. But of this time I expect to spend say from about
January 15 to March 15 in Cincinnati or other Midwestern cities com
pleting rny ideas, notes, and facts for FITCH. I ll be writing short stories
part of the day but circulatin the rest. Then about April ist I can begin
the actual writing of Fitch, and possibly before that particularly if I sell
movie rights of "Willow Walk," which I have directed my agent to sell
if he can get a renewal of the offer of $2500 previously made.

Fitch, then, will be ready for publication either spring or fall of
1922 I don t believe it will hurt a bit to have a year and a half or two
years elapse between Main Street and Fitch, and I can t, doing the job I
want to, get it ready before,

I may, after next April, with my material all ready, go to England for
the actual writing of it both because of the joy and benefit of that ex
perience, and because it will actually be cheaper to live in Europe than
to live here.

Like all my plans always (and yours occasionally, b God!) the above
is subject to change, but that s about how it maps out now. I shall cer
tainly finish Fitch at the earliest possible moment consistent with proper
work; I shall certainly not serialize it; and we willor shall! certainly have
expectant interest from critics, bookstores, and private boosters.

I m glad to say the story rejected by SEP which caused me to write
you has just been accepted by Harper s they pay only $500, half of what
SEP would, but this will relieve the stress, and in many ways it is better
to be writing for Harper s than for SEP leaves me free-er and introduces
me to better book-buying audience. And last nite I finished and sent off

54 MAIN STREET

to Post a story which, if they don t take, Harper s certainly will So I m
already getting ahead the surplus which, for safety, I ought to have above
the guarantee.

I more than understand your limiting the first offer of guarantee to
1921, with renewal probable but not at all assured, and I shan t be hurt if
it proves inadvisable to go on with it after 21.

I am right now working on Fitch. Not a day goes by, literally, that
I don t add many notes to my plans for it, and when I get to Cincinnati
or somewhere, I ll be piling them up to be digested, selected, discarded,
expanded. This, of course, I can do nicely while plugging at short stories.
But when I start the actual writing, I shall do nothing, think nothing, eat
nothing but Fitch, whether I m here or in England.

Good letter at last from Hergesheimer. He says, among others,
"Main Street is a courageous, a lovely, and quite a heart-breaking book.
The detail and labor are stupendous and the felicity open to no question."

So!

As ever, or more so,
si

December 7
Dear Lewis:

Just a line reporting progress. Baker and Taylor re-ordered 2500 last
Saturday; McClurg 250; Macy 500, which is about the way it is going-
like the dickens in New York City, and only beginning to catch on in
the provinces. We have ordered another 5000 to press, which makes total
printings of about 38,000. We have broken joints on every edition so far,
so that we have not been out of it at all either here or at Rahway where
it is bound. I think sales are about 23,000. We d print 10,000 now, but
that takes two weeks instead of ten days, and we want to be sure to have
the last 5000 available on the i6th for the business that may come that
weekend. A telegram for 100 from Pittsburgh this morning; 25 to Albany;
25 to Montclair, etc.

Howe is pulling out, probably the first of January. The difference
between academic and business life was too great, and the connection did
not mean on either side what we had both hoped for, so it seemed best to
sever it before it went on any longer. His withdrawal isn t going to mean
any change in the resources or policies of the business; it is merely inci
dental to our proper growth. 1

Ever yours,
Alf

1 The firm name was shortly changed to Harcourt, Brace and Company.

[1920] 55

Washington Dec. 10
Dear Alf :

Entranced to hear of latest figures you ve sent me. Sorry to hear Will
Howe is planning to pull out.

An aeroplane just came along into a nice open piece of sky right
before my window and casually did five loops. How much simpler to
loaf around in the sky than to write books for Alf to publish for Gus to,
sell for the bookstores to get rid of for poor devils to read!

As ever,
si

December 16
Dear Lewis:

I have just sold an edition of 2000 sheets (of Main Street) to Hodder
and Stoughton for British publication. We are a little behind in our
records, but I think it is a safe guess that we have sold 35,000, not count
ing this British sale. We have printed 43,000, and another 7500 goes on
press tomorrow. Telegram orders this morning show that it is really get
ting its legs in the Middle West. Too bad they were so slow about it for
Christmas business, but it means the sure carry-over to next year. I hear
it is to be the book-of-the-month in February Hearst s, which is also an
assistance in that direction, and perhaps an intimation that you are on the
verge of a flirtation with the Cosmopolitan Book Company, Rumor is that
they have just paid Joe Lincoln $75,000 for book and serial on his next.

Yours,
Alf

Washington, Thursday, December 16
Dear Alf:

I ve got to draw my five hundred for next February. Can you send it
to me as soon as you get this? The last five hundred you sent me was
almost wiped out by my last installment of $358 on income tax, paid on
the 1 4th. I have $42 in the bank, and forty in cash, and on Saturday Dec.
1 8 I have to pay $200 in rent; on Monday $35 in office rent; on December
27th $125 insurance premium; along with a few incidentals such as food.

Harper s have now owed me $500 for a story for two weeks. In

Wells s 1 letter of acceptance he said he was having "the voucher put

through right away." Ten days ago I wrote him saying I d love to have

the check in a few days. Day before yesterday I telegraphed him asking

1 Thomas B. Wells, editor of Harper s Magazine.

56 MAIN STREET

him to get it in the Tuesday mail. Not only have I not had it but I have
had no answer whatever from him. Meantime he isor is supposed to be-
considering a second story, one that I regard as the best I have done for
a long time, but rejected by the Post. Also Siddall l is considering one
finished a week ago for the American, and I finish another for the Amer
ican tomorrow. Also my movie agent says, in letter received today, that
, he is almost certain he can sell "Willow Walk" movie rightsand for
more than $2500. And while all these beautiful things go on I have $80
to meet about $600 worth of expenses which will have to be met before
January first . . . and Grace has been going cold evenings because we
can t afford to send $125 to Jaeckel to get out her fur coat, which had to
be repaired. . . .

It s all coming I ll be all right once the American and Harper checks
begin coming, but meantime I turn to you again, Alfand I give all the
above depressing data not for the joy of whining (not hitherto a sport
necessary to me) but that you may know I do not turn lightly. This new
$500 should, of course, count as the February check.

si

Washington, Friday, December 17
Dear Alf :

It begins to break right again! Letter this morning from Siddall of
the American, taking stoiy done last week for $750 and promising check
soon. As this is a very short story, only 4500 words, as against the 9000
or 10,000 words I usually do for the Post, it is at a much higher rate than
the Post s $1000 per story. And Siddall is very anxious for a number of
others-one of which I ll finish today or tomorrow. So, despite the fact
that I still haven t heard from Harper s, this makes everything start right.
I ll do six or eight stories for Siddall (they take less than a week apiece)
and so be way ahead before I start the next novel be enough ahead so
that, with this lump in addition to your guarantee, I shan t have to worry
again till late spring of 1922, at least

The sale is glorious! 35,000! And a start in England! Hope you may
be able to use the Galsworthy letter in connection with that. Mary Austin
writes me she is sending some copies abroad. That probably means H. G.
Wells among others, as she is a correspondent of his, and this may help
in England. Want to ask her to send one to him?

So yiou think the Cosmopolitan Book people may get after me may
offer me vast and indecent sums? Alf, they don t make enough money to

1 John M. Siddall, editor of the American Magazine.

[1920] 57

get me off n Harcourt, Brace and Howe. Entirely aside from all questions
of friendship and decent appreciation of the magnificent way in which
you ve handled Main Street, I am quite sure that as a cold business matter,
no one could do so well by my books as Harcourt. When the Hearst
people get after me-if they do-Fll tell them to go to hell-as I have once
already told them, a year ago, apropos of short stories.

Gaw, I hope we can keep Main Street going all next year. I suppose
we ll have to do a little advertising next year, and a lot of keeping after
the dealers who get slack on stock, but it really seems now as tho there
was enough discussion to keep it going. Frinstance, t other evening I met
Jane Addams and the wife of an editor on the Manchester Guardian, and
they both knew all about it. Same with Norman Hapgood.

Now to work* I feel much cheerier today feel as tho the immense
immobility, for the last week symbolized by Harper s, is giving way.
Siddall is very keen for my stuff, and ready to pay. And every day the
notes for the next novel go down in the book.

By the way, I ve changed the name again, from FITCH to BABBITT.
Fitch, I realized, would to so many critics carry a connotation of Clyde
Fitch, dead tho he is. The name now for my man is George F. Babbitt,
which, I think, sounds commonplace yet will be remembered, and two
years from now we ll have them talking of Babbittry (not at all the same
thing as Potterism) . x

As ever,
si

Washington, Tuesday, Dec. 2 1
Dear Alf :

Wrote gloomily to you on Thursday, acceptance from American on
Friday, check from you on Saturday, check from American on Monday
for $750, check from Harper s the long-delayed one today; $1750 in
three days, so that I m able to meet all the bills and work again in a
beautiful security. And Harper s and the American are both now con
sidering other stories. And, after spending all this week on notes about
Babbitt, the next novel, I ll do another American story next week.

Next, and very interesting, is the fact that Vachel Lindsay has con
stituted himself a committee to make the whole of Springfield, 111., and
the surrounding Sangamon County, with 100,000 population, read M St.
(This is confidential, but he says that he has a secret Machiavellian plan
to make them read it as a preparation to reading his own Golden Book of
Springfield. Really, he is making this a perfectly definite campaign!)

1 An expression made popular by Rose Macaulay s satirical novel Potterism.

58 MAIN STREET

He asks ( i ) that you send a review copy to his friend Frank Waller
Allen, Springfield. Allen will lecture about the book, says Lindsay, all
over Central Illinois. (2) Send a large bunch of M St s on consignment to
Coe Brothers, after winning Mr. Coe s consent thereto. (3) Try to get
H. E. Barker Art Store to take another consignment.

Now may I suggest that (4) tho I am writing myself to Lindsay you
also write to him, thanking him. Really I think from his letter that he is
prepared to campaign for M St as tho it were his job, and at the very least,
he will make the book talkd of. Doubtless much of Springfield regard
their poet as quite mad, but doubtless also there s a few hundred people
who regard him as inspired as I most certainly do! Lindsay s friendship
for me is based not only on his own liking for At St but also on my having
quoted and praised a poem of his in Free Air and that quote in the S.E.P.,
said he, meant more to his benighted townsmen than hundreds of pages in
the Nation et all! Will you then please suggest to him your gladness to
co-operate.

Gawd this has been a long and meaty letter, and I pity you, having to
plug thru it, but I hope all the details may be of value. Oh. I m getting
after Al Woods and his interest in dramatic rites on M St through Giffen,
my agent.

As I may not write you more than six or eight more times before
Dec. 25

MERRY CHRISTMAS!
si

December 23
Dear Lewis:

We shall attend carefully to the Vachel Lindsay-Springfield Illinois
suggestion, but not until next week because the booksellers there will
merely be cleaning up from their Christmas trade and taking inventory,
and not wanting to see any more stock until after the first of January.
We are writing to Lindsay at once, as you suggest.

For a book and its publishers to have created a demand for 50,000
since October 23rd is going some, and as far as Main Street is concerned,
we are all entitled to a very Merry Christmas. I think I said in a longhand
note the other day that we wouldn t stop to figure up the advertising
appropriation until I got the actual bills on the third of January, I know
we have enough so that I am ordering January advertising. I think we ll
have something like $3000 to spend after the first of January earned by
sales to the first of January. If the figures work out that way, I d be
inclined to propose that the 15% royalty begin with sales after January

[ 1920 ] 59

first and that we use up the balance of the money earned on fall sales on
the spring advertising.

Ever yours,
Alf

Washington, Tuesday, December 28
Dear Alf:

Bully ad, the rooster crowing over Main Street sale. And I hope all
of you are now somewhat recovered from the rush of the last few days
before Christmas, which must have been terrific.

Interesting note about Babbitt, yours on the edge of the ad "hidden
undercurrents of loves, work, training, friends, associates, shaping an
ambitious man s career." Only it isn t the ambitiousness of Babbitt which
is emphasized. He is ambitious, very much so, but "ambition" gives an
idea of a man who climbs very high, whereas Babbitt never becomes more
than a ten-thousand-a-year real estate man. He is the typical T.B.M., the
man you hear drooling in the Pullman smoker; but having once so seen
him, I want utterly to develop him so that he will seem not just typical
but an individual. I want the novel to be the G.A.N. in so far as it crystal
lizes and makes real the Average Capable American. No one has done it,
I think; no one has even touched it except Booth Tarkington in Turmoil
and Magnificent Ambersons; and he romanticizes away all bigness. Babbitt
is a little like Will Kennicott but bigger, with a bigger field to work on,
more sensations, more perceptions. . . . He is all of us Americans at 46,
prosperous but worried, wanting passionately to seize something more
than motor cars and a house be-fore it s too late. Yet, utterly unlike Carol,
it never even occurs to him that he might live in Europe, might like
poetry, might be a senator; he is content to live and work in the city of
Zenith, which is, as everybody knows, the best little ole city in the world.
But he would like for once the flare of romantic love, the satisfaction of
having left a mark on the city, and a let-up in his constant warring on
competitors, and when his beloved friend Riesling commits suicide, he
suddenly says, "Oh hell, what s the use of the cautious labor to which
I ve given everything 7 only for a little while is he discontented, though.
... I want to make Babbitt big in his real-ness, in his relation to all of
us, not in the least exceptional, yet dramatic, passionate, struggling.

Why don t you lay plans to have Main Street translated into the
Scandinavian tongues? So many of the characters are Scandinavians, and
so great is the interest in America in Scandinavia, that it ought to go there.
But I wouldn t think of speaking about it to a man like Bjorkman, to
whom nothing good is done unless it is by a man named Edwin.

60 MAIN STREET

Another most friendly letter from John Galsworthy, from Santa
Barbara, California; speaks of our meeting in Washington, winds up "may
we soon have from you another book baked as thoroughly (in this half-
baked age) as Main Street" Have you got in touch with him yet? Want
me to write & ask Galsworthy to do a quotable opinion & use his letter?

My agent is apparently still negotiating with Al Woods about Main
Street stage and movie rightsdon t know whether anything will come
of it or not. Meantime I write short stories and make millions of notes
about Babbitt. And incidentally an occasional note about the eleven other
novels for which I have more or less vague plans!

Happy New Year, and a prosperous one!

As ever,

si

Do as seems wisest to you about the 15% royalty. I m more than willing
to go ahead on 10% as long as it s useful to do lots of advertising.

[19211
Jan. 4
Dear Lewis:

I ve been so darned busy this afternoon I didn t get time to dictate
this letter to you, and now all the stenogs have gone home and here it is
only a quarter to seven so I m typing myself, one finger of each hand,
to say:

Some time ago I talked to The American Play Company about pic
ture rights of Main Street, and told them to go to it and see what they
could do. This morning they phoned that they had someone interested in
the dramatic rights. I told them to take the matter up with you direct.
The dramatic rights would, they tell me, include movie rights, and movie
production would naturally wait till after the play and would be corre
spondingly more valuable. If there is anything you want me to do to help
along, let me know.

Can t keep this up any longer ends of fingers getting sore. Started
13,000 MS. printing today.

Yours,
Alf

It is not evident from the correspondence whether Lewis came to New
York or whether negotiations were conducted by telephone. However,
arrangements were made through Elisabeth Marbury of American flay
Company for the dramatization of Main Street by Harvey O Higgins and
Harriet Ford for the Shubert Brothers.

[1921 ] 61

Washington, Sat Jan 15
Dear Alf :

I enclose a pompous official statement of your share in play and movie
rights.

Friend writes from NY that she met a bunch of Swede and Nor
wegian professors (presumably in Lutheran-American colleges in US)
and they all talked Main Street and said it was better than Knut Hamsun s
Hunger, which won the Nobel Prize. This friend is Mrs. Frank P. No-
howel of Islip, Long Island. She is the type of cultured, musical, poly
lingual German- American with lots of money who is as used to Europe
as to America, and she s not a close enough personal friend to be too
prejudiced. Why don t you write to her, get from her the names of three
or four of the profs who best combine influence with enthusiasm for
M St., get in touch with them, and have them send copies of M St to the
Ole Country, both to arouse general interest in it there (as a novel and
as a picture of Scandinavians in US) and to see if there may not be one
chance in 50,000 that we d get the Nobel prize on M St or a later novel.
They are likely to know, and write to, Scandinavian publishers, and pos
sibly even to the committee that gives decision on the Nobel prize. I pass
this buck to you because I couldn t speak of it to Mrs. Nohowel without
seeming egotisticaller n hell.

Probably be in NY about a week from now end of next week-for
a day or so on the play, with O Higgins and Miss Ford, then immediately
duck west, but I ll see you.

As ever,
si

[Enclosure]

January 15, 1921
Gentlemen:

As you know, there are now afoot negotiations for the dramatization
of my novel Main Street, published by you, with a probability that fol
lowing the stage version, there will be a motion picture made of the book.
My contracts are not yet signed but the probabilities are strong enough to
make it now proper to present the following offer.

Though there is in my Main Street contract no mention of stage or
motion picture rights, and though I could claim all sums accruing from
dramatic presentation, it is my feeling that your efforts as publishers have
so far enhanced the commercial value of the book that you have an ethical
right to participation in all gains from such presentations which amounts
to something more than a mere legal right.

I therefore, in accordance with our recent conversations, propose

62 MAIN STREET

(and this may be taken as an official addition to the contract) that Har-
court, Brace and Howe shall be entitled to twenty (20) per cent of what
ever sums I may make from the stage presentation over and above the first
$7500 (seven thousand, five hundred dollars), with the proviso that unless
I make such sum of $7500 for my share, they shall be entitled to nothing;
and that out of the motion picture earnings, they shall be entitled to
twenty (20) per cent of my share after I shall have made $5000 (five
thousand dollars), but be entitled to nothing unless I make at least that
$5000.

Let me add that it seems to me that in this arrangement I am really
giving you a very small share, and that this smallncss is justified only by
the fact that by having money ahead, and my time thus kept clear, I shall
be able to continue with other novels from which, I hope, we shall all
profit.

If by any chance the present negotiations, with Shubert Brothers,
through Miss Elisabeth Marbury, should fall through, and later another
theatrical arrangement should be made, the terms outlined above are still
to stand.

Let me sum up your share more briefly: Harcourt, Brace and Howe
to have 20% of my net earnings on the stage play from Main Street over
and above $7500, which I am to have clear; and 20% on my net motion
picture earnings over and above $5000, which I am to have clear.

Sincerely yours,
Sinclair Lewis

Washington, Wednesday January 19
Dear Alf :

I ll reach NY tomorrow afternoon and be there till Friday or Satur
day evening, I may call you up tomorrow afternoon, but please don t wait
in for me if I m tied up with O Higgins and Ford I ll see you Friday.

In the Baltimore Evening Sun for Jan 3, H, L. Mencken has a good
second review of M St very amusing. Percy Hammond says in the Chi
cago Tribune: "As an antidote to the brag, bluster, boosting, Watch Us
Grow green sickness still epidemic in the nation, Main Street has not its
equal in American fiction."

si

By this time the success of Main Street wets assured, and when Le<wis
arrived in New York on the 20th, his monthly guarantee payment was
increased -from $joo to $1000.

[1921] 63

Double Duck Farm
Martinsville, New Jersey
Sat Jan 29
Dear Alf :

How s the book been going this past week? Play goes fine we ll
finish by end of next week then I ll have coupla days in N.Y. & start
West see you before I go.

Have you sent to England Galsworthy s letters (both of em) & news
of how the book is going? They ought to be ordering more than 2000.

Greetings!
SL

Martinsville, N J., Jan 3 1
Dear Alf:

If you want it & it s rawther good F. Scott Fitzgerald says: "After
a third reading I want to say that Alain Street has displaced Tberon
Ware 1 in my favor as the best American novel"

SL

Queen City Club
Cincinnati, O.
Feb. 1 6
Dear Alf:

Off to Chicago this evening 3 lectures there. Back here Feb. zist or
22nd. Drop me a line & let me know how book has been going since I saw
you on the 8th. Examine enclosed Toronto clipping with care (it s a
corker) & see if you can t somehow use it to make those hellhounds in
Canada sell a few copies.

Note: Sam Margolies writes me that a relative of his met the great
Gordon Selfridge 2 of London, who proved to be much interested in
M, St. Why don t you call up Sam about this & send the news over to
Hodder Stoughton. He mite be the cause of several thousand selling in
London.

Bully time, met lots of people, really getting the feeling of life here.
Fine for Babbitt. . . .

As ever,
SL

1 Damnation of Theron Ware by Harold Frederic.

2 Harry Gordon Selfridge. Born in America, he founded Selfridge and Company,
Ltd., London, one of the largest department stores in Europe.

64 MAIN STREET

Sunday 20th (address Queen City Club, Cincinnati)
Dear Gus:

Will have made 6 talks in Chicago & North Shore suburbs before I
return to Cincin, Tuesday. Notably that under the auspices of Book
sellers League, on the i8th, with a lot of the trade present. They seemed
to like it a lot, & Mcdn St. is selling fast all over town. So wouldn t this be
a good time to try to get McClurg s to take 5000? They were out, several
days. Carson Pirie had a big JM St window.

About Sears-Roebuck. Not only was the Book & Play lecture @
Julius Rosenwald s l house, but he d read Main St himself & professed to
be crazy about ithe used many excellent adjectives! Also he seemed to
like me & wanted to show me thru Sears-Roebuck. Can t you somehow
use his personal interest to get S-R to take an order? I think that if their
buyer talked with Rosenwald he d recommend it. (And R. was delighted
by fact that S-R were mentioned.)

I ve called on several bookshops, including McClurg s, Marshall Field,
Kroch, & become chummy. So this field will, I hope, be more favorable
than ever.

Sincerely,
Sinclair Lewis

Cincinnati, February 25
Dear Alf :

Because it is so out and out can t you use Octavus Roy Cohen s
statement, "I consider Main Street by far the greatest American novel
ever written"? You have noticed, of course, how Zell, Seedy of the Sun
and Sister s^in-law are all being advertised as better than Main Street! It
would be a very fresh, but might it not be an effective ad to say,

THANKS FOR THE COMPLIMENT!

Three big books of the spring season arc all being advertised as "Better
than Main Street. 1 This admission that during the four months since it was
published, Main Street has become the standard for comparison is received
with gratitude.

I shall lecture in Pittsburgh on March 3rd, and in Milwaukee on
March ryth, and you might warn the bookshops in those two towns to be
ready for an invasion. You can truthfully say to them that both in Chi
cago and Cincinnati the added interest due to my coming was sufficient
to cause bookshops to run out of stock.

1 Merchant and philanthropist; President of Sears-Roebuck and Company. In
1917 he created the Rosenwald Fund for the well-being of mankind.

[1921] 65

Between Walpole, Galsworthy, and Laski, we ought to get some
serious critical attention in England, and I hope that Hoddeir & Stoughton
know about all of them.

As ever,
SL

Cincinnati, March 5
Dear Alf :

March check, for $1000, received this morningthanks. But why so
brief and curt? Why don t you say howdy? And how is the book doing
now? Pittsburgh lecture, Thursday, seemed a great success; and I was
introduced to the bookstore men. . . . Asinine story about me in last
McClurg s Bulletin you know I never said "My word" or "deuced."
Still, at that, it s probably good publicity.

I ll be here till the tenth, then, via Bradford, Pa., to Chicago.

As ever,
SL

Cincinnati, Mar 7
Dear Alf:

Lectures coming (if you want to inform booksellers): Mar. u
Bradford, Pa. The Literary Club; Mar. 1 5 Milwaukee College Club, @
Athenaeum; Mar. 19 Winnetka 111. (write Evanston stores??); Mar. si-
Sinai Social Center, Chi; Mar. 29 Town Hall, N.Y.; Apr. i or 2: Prince
ton, N.J. before a student organization. That will be about my last lec
ture. Thenthank Gawd I cut em out!

I have your letter of Mar. 5. Glad of the i30,ooo. x Good luck y old
mem!

As ever,
SL

Cincin
Dear Alf:

Off for Bradford, Pa., then Chi, tonight. Gave a lil talk for John Kidd
@ Pogue s auditorium yesterday & he sold about 70 copies afterward, just
for a starter.

I m to lecture for the College Club, Detroit, on April it; & some
woman s club in Harrisburg, Pa., April 2. Both places will boost the show,

1 Sales of Main Street.

66 MAIN STREET

& I think you ought to be able to sell books in anticipation. Also Women s
Canadian Club, Hamilton, Ontario, April 13.

As ever,
SL

Chicago, Mar, 19
Dear Alf :

I ll be back in Washington on March 23, & stay there several days
before lecture in N.Y. on the 2pth.

About the second serialization. I wired you yesterday that I wish
you d talk to several bookmen e.g. Fred Hood x & Melcher 2 of the Pub
lishers Weekly before deciding about this. I wouldn t take any chance
of injuring the sale, which ought to keep up all this year; & 2nd serial
rights may, possibly, be worth as much next year as this, particularly if
the play goes well next -fall. Or would the 2nd serial help the sale? I want
to leave the decision to you but, with our perfectly good chance of a sale
of 100,000 from June to December this year, for the love of Mike be care
ful & take counsel. I back you up in whatever you may finally decide but
don t be tempted by ready serial-money if it s going to be bad in the long
run. . . . Isn t Four Horsemen of Apocalypse being serialized no<w, 100
years after publication? Or wasn t it recently? . . . Wonder how much
they got for it? ... In any case I certainly shouldn t release before June
15. Do be carefulthis may involve thirty or forty thousand dollars. But,
I repeat, I m with you when you finally do decide what will be best in the
long run.

Do you think it would be wise for me to autograph books @ the new
bookshop of which you speak? Wouldrit it make the other shops sore?
I m afraid of it. But if you re quite sure there s no danger of that, I d just
as soon. It would have to be on March 2 9th, I think.

I don t seem to agree with nothin" in this letter, but let s be sure about
both these propositions. I hate to tinker with a good market.

As ever,
SL

Apr. 8 (On the train between

Urbana & Galesburg, III)
Dear Alf:

U of 111 lecture seemed great success. They ve all been frantically
discussing Main St. Met a lot of the English faculty Zeitlin, Miss Rinaker,

1 Fred R. Hood, vice-president of the Baker Taylor Company.

2 Frederic G. Melcher, co-editor of Publishers " Weekly.

[1921] 67

Scott, et al, & made a hit with most of them, I think. I know Stuart Sher
man liked -me. Stayed @ his house. Smoker of Eng. instructors after the
lecture; then, from 12 to 2 AM, the Shermans & I sat & talked, me giving
a hand to H.B.&Co. For all his Spingarn-Mencken complex Sherman is a
fine solid fellow. See you late next week.

As ever,
SL

Lewis arrived in New York the end of the following week and left almost
immediately for Washington, from where there is a letter dated April
1 8th pertaining to various business matters he discussed with Harcowt
while he was in New York.

Washington, Thursday, April 28
Dear Alf :

I ll probably see you next Monday. We leave here Saturday morning,
and go right thru to Forest Hills, LL-we 11 stay at the Forest Hills Inn
till we sail.

I think I ve bullied the Wayfarers Shop here enough about their small
orders so that Gus might be able to sell them a hundred if he dropped
them a note. Introduced myself at last to Sid Avery of Brentano s and he
was more than cordial.

Are you following up translations into Swedish, Danish, French, etc.?

See you Monday!
SL

Lewis was in personal tomb with the office while he was at Forest Hills
until his departure with his family for England in May. The first word
from him after his arrival on the other side was a letter dated Jwe 4th.

BABBITT

THREE

Creation Abroad

[1921]

Cadogan Hotel

Sloane Street, London, S.W.i

June 4

(Address % Guaranty Trust Co., 50 Pall Mall,
as before~no cottage yet-too much London! )
Dear Alf :

A bully time! Mostly bumming about London, dining and having tea.
Saw Jonathan Cape 1 about the second day. Called on Geoffrey Williams 2
and he took me to lunch at the Savile (where I encountered W. L. George
and had a long talk-of course about American Wimmin) and had me
made honorary member for a month; will also have me made temporary
member for a year if I want. Nice chap. Tea with Harold Laski, whom
both Gracie and I like immensely and of whom I expect to see a lot
Lunch at Hodder- Williams 3 house yesterday, with Pinker* there, all
very pleasant. Have a feeling he never will sell any Main St but I m going
to try to suggest a few methods. Seen Pawling 5 a lot of times-he s a
corker. . . . Then we ve lunched and dined with an assortment of people,
and begin to have some feeling of London. Went up to Sonning to look
for a house otherwise weVe shystered on that important duty! Luck!

As ever,
si

1 English publisher who had recently started his own firm.

2 Of Williams and Norgate, British publishers.

8 Sir Ernest Hodder- Williams, chairman of Hodder & Stoughton.

4 Of James B. Pinker and Son, English literary agents.

5 Sydney S. Pawling, partner in William Heinemann, Publishers.

72 BABBITT

London, June 1 5
Dear Alf :

Good, awfully good, to get your long letter written at home. I ll
write a personal letter to Don today. Hope he is all right now. Terribly
sorry to hear of his sickness. He is one of the finest as well as most ef
ficientof human beings. Glad you re able to take over the whole house
at One West 47; that ought to add greatly to ease of working. Yon ought
to have a coop all to yourself, and off the ground floor. How many M Sts
have sold now, and how goes the second serial campaign of Aley? x

I am now just beginning to feel that itch which means that I want to
get back to writing, and after about three weeks more I shall start. I ll do
just one short story, to get my hand in (it will take only about a week)
and then get right at Babbitt. ... I think it will have been a good thing,
this long long loaf, and will have quite cleared out the long accumulated
weariness of writing almost without cessation for years,

Our plans? We d hoped to find a country house into which we could
move July ist, but the only one we ve liked enough to want to spend
quite a time in is not free to August ist. We ve just taken that, after a
long hunt and an examination of many other houses which, though it
didn t produce a home, did give us many hikes, by motor and train, thru
country we mightn t have seen, and did give us an excuse to butt rather
intimately into a number of houses. . . . Yesterday, for example, we
drove all over Surrey the Hindhead moor, Dorking, Reigate, etc. flats,
then rolling hilly moors all gorse and heather, then suave farming coun
try; and we looked at several houses. And last week we flirted with a
twelfth (really) century manor house near Oxford, and spent a couple
days sightseeing at Oxford (and lunching, tell Spingarn, with his cordial
friend, Percy Simpson, a don) .

The house we ve finally settled on is an early sixteenth century one
with marvelous old beams and half-timberingexcellent bath room and
furnishing, however, with perhaps half an acre of tennis lawns, garden,
etc., right on the common (so Wells 2 can play with village boys and have
his nose instructively punched) in the tiny old village of Bearstccl, near
Maidstone, in the heart of Kent farming countryhops and wheat. The
village is in a valley and beyond the old gables across the common rise
smooth hills. Quelque platz!

Meantime, we ll spend ten days or two weeks more in London, go
for July down to a hotel in, say, Cornwall or Devon, with the sea for a

1 Maxwell Aley, manager of Century Newspaper Service,

2 Wells Lewis, born July 26, 1917, was the only child of Grace and Sinclair
Lewis.

[ 1921 ] 73

contrast to Kent, and after a week or two sightseeing, with probably some
walking, I ll get on the job.

Look. Here s something to remember. In case I should ever need
money suddenly, I d cable you (say) "Cable one thousand," and what I
wish you d do is take the money to the Guaranty Trust and have them
cable it to my account here on Pall Mall. Probably I shall never need this,
but we d better have it understood.

I ve blown in a reasonable amount of money, including several grate
ful quids on gins and bitters, Asti Gran Spuma(n?)ti, Chablis, and long
Scotch and sodas; and after letting my wardrobe become practically non
existent, I ve bought some clothes, but I don t think we ve been partic
ularly extravagant. We still have a whale of a lot of money left, and shall
not need to start the thousand a month again for quite a time.

English hotel prices, just now, are quite as high as America, and so is
food at such hotels as the Savoy, but otherwise things are very much
cheaper. I m getting a suit for twenty-two guineas at one of the best
tailors in town. It s true that at one time it would have cost only about
fifteen guineas here, but for a suit of like material and workmanship I d
be paying right now, in U.S., about $135 (bein as it has an extra pair of
pants with it). I paid one pound for a hat at Heath s which would cost
eight or ten dollars in the States. Our country place in Kent would, for
that sort of place so near to N.Y., cost at least $250 a month, and we get
it for nine guineas a week including silver and linen say one hundred and
seventy a month. Servants still get very small wages from thirty-five to
fifty pounds a year and found. On the whole prices seem to be enor
mously higher than they were five years ago, but still only about two-
thirds of what they are in America. I m quite sure that my American
accent adds a bob here and a quid there but I haven t been here long
enough yet to be able to tell.

Of the coal strike there are curiously few traces. Nobody mentions
it. Really if it weren t for the dry-fact stories about it in my Times and
the fact that railroad service is about cut in half I d never know there was
a strike.

I know one thing, now, I think I d never want to live in England.
It s fun, I do get some contrasts by which I see America more clearly,
but oh, it s a dying land. No eagerness. The aristocracy absolutely as
firmly ruling as ever. I d been told that everywhere, since the war, I d find
a rude and resentful servant class. Nonsense. They re as meek as ever. As
in the old days, the Derby, the Ascot, the prospects of autumn hunting,
and the minor incidents of the visit of the Prince of Wales to Cardiff are
so incomparably more important than any strike, any book, any edu
cational news, any reform, any business news, that one feels only the

74 BABBITT

nobility and the hunting set really exist. ... I had dinner with Oliver
Onions and his wife Berta Ruck the other evening, and they spent all the
time praising the aristocracy and cursing any force that might imperil
its splendorthe coal strikers are horned and hoofed fiends and W. L.
George, for very mildly sympathizing with the Bolsheviks, is some kind
of a degenerate.

We dine with W. L. George this evening, by the way, and lunch
with Walpole tomorrow, then have dinner with Margaret Wycherley,
and on Sunday we dine with the Harold Laskis. Last week Hodder- Wil
liams gave us a reception, very nice, tho Frank Swinnerton was the only
one present who much excited me. Others there were E, Phillips Oppcn-
heim, William Robertson Nicoll, Berta Ruck, Ruby Ayres ( ! ) , Clement
Shorter, Mrs. Belloc Lowndes, and so on.

Lots of good luck, old man, I think I shall have to start writing a
book called, if I remember rightly, Babbitt.

Zever,
si

London, June 2 1
Dear Alf :

Haven t encountered any new writers whom I ve wanted to grab
yet; everything is, of course, pretty quiet because of the printing situation*

Been having a good time. Be here for nine days more, then go to
Cornwall for a month at a hotel at Mullion, then to Kent for two months.
I shall start Babbitt in Cornwall. Had dinner and talked to some students
at Laski s, taken yesterday by Laski to lunch of Nation editors Brailsford,
Massingham, Hirst, Nevinson, et al there. AND so on, with some sightsee
ing and last Sunday a wild lunch at Claude Grahame- White s country
place, much booze and tennis and Ethel Levy and Marc Klaw, and the
Duncan Sisters.

Last night dined with Hodder- Williams (or rather, had him at an
agreeable but hellishly expensive dinner at Claridge s, with Clemenceau at
the next table, bein over here to get his D.C.L. from Oxford) and as
delicately as possible suggested that I d love to have him sell some Main
Streets. He said he could do a whole lot more if he had a lower price on
sheets and I promised to hint as much to you, and here I am hinting and
of course you never could guess that I d promised Sir Ernest to write you.
. . Seriously, if it can be made to go over here, I think it might be a
good thing in the matter of kudos. Whether he s getting sheets at so high
a price that he can t make any money on them, I don t know; and natur
ally I shall not butt in nor ever recommend any price to him that will not

[1921] . 75

allow you at least a little profit. But this I can say: He seems strongly in
favor of the Lewises, and I d keep after him, and politely, if I were you.
I think rny being over here will somewhat help the English sale. Hodder-
Williams has really been awfully nicelunch and reception, which last
resulted in an account in the News which I haven t seen, in the British
Weekly thing by Robertson Nicoll, etc.

I want you to read with considerable care the enclosed letter from
Edith Summers Kelley an old friend of mine, former secretary of Upton
Sinclair, first wife of Allan Updegraff, now married to a man who is, I
should judge tho I have never met him, a charming companion with ar
tistic leanings. It sounds to me as tho she had a novel here, as tho she had
grown from the poetic yearnings she had fifteen years ago when I knew
her best to real stuff for a good American novel. She knows the Kentucky
background of which she speaks; her husband and she farmed there for
several years. Why don t you write her expressing willingness to see
some ms?

We re to meet H.G.Wells and Rebecca West this week, and to dine
with Hugh Walpole, Frank Swinnerton, Rose Macaulay. But after an
other nine days of dinners and the like, it will be good to get to the sea,
to Cornish villages, to walking and to work!

Zever,
si

Poldhu Hotel
Mullion, S. Cornwall
July i
Dear Alf :

Thursday morning we left London for here a delightful and easy
journey thru Wiltshire, Devon, and so on; hills wooded or patched with
colored fields, and a few glimpses of a radiant sea.

Since writing you the most interesting person I ve met has been
Rebecca West. If she proves not to be too tied up to Century I may try
to pinch her off. Same with Norman Angell. These are the only authors
I ve met who seemed worth much for us and with both of them I have
merely sung the praises of HB&Co. and delicately suggested that if they
should ever have a hiatus in their American publishing plans, I know that
the esteemed Mr. Harcourt would be interested in them. . . .

Sorry to say I have not met Strachey yet. Did have lunch with James
Whitall just before leaving, and liked him a lot. ... I feel (and it s im
portant if my feeling is right) that tho the Young British Authors of the
Walpole-Mackenzie type have been of great importance, there is just now

76 BABBITT

quite as much literary energy breaking loose in America as over here; I
feel that the Britishers are rather settling down to a great smug content
ment with their clever selves; and if this is true, our future as publishers
will be, as largely it has been, with the Americans rather than with the
Britishers. . . . Some day I ought to go out and make a young-author-
visiting trip for HB&Co in America. . , , Good luck with Strachey- 1

This hotel is on a cliff, overlooking the most glorious vista of sea
and out-reaching cliffs along the shore one sees clear down to Mount
St. Michael* We shall have some good walks. The hotel itself is second
rate and the people look duller than hell Main Street s respectables va
cationing. All of which is to the good because it means that I shall at
once get busy on Babbitt; working daily till midafternoon, then tramping
and a little swimming, London is really too exciting to do much work
in. Smorning I sat on the edge of my bed thinking about Babbitt for half
an hour when I was supposed to be dressing.

We ll be here till July 29, then to October ist, at our blinkin Eliza
bethan cottage in Bearsted. Now to Babbitt/

As ever,

rf

P.S. Also N.B. I still have about ^340 in England, even after buying a
helluva lot of clothes, and the expensive London visit (down here it costs
us only about half as much as in London) , and paying in advance for half
the rent of the Kent house which we shall have for nine weeks. That will
last me about two months more. But I guess I d better be sure of plenty
of money here, and I want to keep my N,Y. account well ahead. So will
you please have Don deposit $3500 to my account at the Guaranty Trust
Co.? This should last me till mid-December indeed if the play goes well,
I may not have to call on you for any more money at all till way long
next year. Is it convenient for you to pay out this $3500 now? If not,
make it lesssay $2000, And can you let me know, roughly, how much
money is coming to me from HJB.&Gx after deducting this $3500 (or
$2000)? I m getting balled up*

SL

July 5
Dear Lewis:

I Coronaed you a note from home yesterday saying how Don was
and that sort of thing.

Ho dder ^Williams, We have had two transactions with Sir Ernest in
the last eight months: Main Street and The World s Illusion, and it is the

1 Harcourt, Brace had just published, on June loth, Lytton Strachey s Queen
Victoria.

[ 1921 ] 77

most glowing example of negotiations after a contract is signed that I
have seen in a rather long experience. It isn t as if he had been "stuck,"
but he bought two good books at moderate prices. He pays 50 cents a
copy in flat sheets, including royalty, for Main Street. He should have set
the book and paid us 100 pounds advance. I let him take sheets as a favor
and because both you and I were anxious for the kudos that would come
from prompt British publication. I ll show you all the documents when
you come home.

I am glad you hooked up with the Laskis. He is a smart young man.

Yours,
Alf

Cornwall, July 12
Dear Alf:

He s started Babbittand I think he s going to be a corker. I ve
been working on him for a week now, mostly, of course, turning notes
into a final plan, but also writing a little, and I find him coming out firm
and real.

I think that Babbitt is the best name for him and the best title for
the book as well. One remembers name-titles really better than apparently
more striking titles, and it so causes the public to remember the name of
the central character that he is more likely to be discussed. I haven t yet
thought of any other satisfactory titles. The following are the only ones
I ve thought of: POPULATION, 300,0006000 BUSINESSSOUND BUSINESS
A GOOD PRACTICAL MAN-A HE-MAN-THE BOOSTER-A SOLID CITIZEN
ZENITH and none of them satisfy me. Are there any of the above which
you like better than Babbitt?

I have your letter of June zznd. Write me often. You and Ellen are
really the only people who keep me in touch with things in the States.
Terribly glad Don can be in the office again. Make him go up to Maine
for a month this summer. I recommend Kennebago Lake.

Your use of the (much appreciated) Robert Morss Lovett letter in
an advertisement is a corker and should be of value. But I don t like so
much the phrase "remarkably well-written tale" in the last part of the
ad sounds somewhat as though you were saying wonderingly, "Why,
this book isn t badly written-for a best-seller!"

This is (and I think Kent will also be) a fine place for work. I have
a room to myself; I get on the job immejit after breakfast: work thru
to tea time, then go for a walk or a swim or both, and read or talk in
the evenings. Not much doing here in the way of gaiety, which is much
better for me. Walking interesting beautiful cliffs and sandy coves along
the sea, and in the interior, charming old villages with churches of about

78 BABBITT

1450 and thatched cottages. I m in fine shape & at once seeing real Eng
land, keeping husky, and getting a lot of work done. Cheers!

Harriet Ford writes me that Main Street the play is to go into re
hearsal in NY about July 14, and rehearse three or four weeks. I do wish
you d see a rehearsal after a week or two, both so that you might let me
know how it is going, and because you might have some good sugges
tions to make to Harvey and Harriet.

Good luck!
SL

Cornwall, July twentieth
Dear Miss Eayrs:

I am writing you as my husband s English secretary: The chances are
we shall, be in England not later than October first, so it hardly seems
worth while to establish a cable address. I rather think we shall go to
Italy in the autumn.

Will you be so good as to call at Brcntano s and see what they have
in the way of books on house plans, big and little, houses, Georgian,
Dutch Colonial, and other suburban kinds? Country Life, House Beau
tiful, House and Garden probably get out such books collected from
designs issued in their magazines. Hal 1 needs them for his real estate de
velopments in the new novel, and there are a lot of technical terms he
does not know. Have the books as up to date as possible. Use your own
judgment as to the most helpful. Thanks a million times.

Cornwall is as enchanting as ever, but the people arc as dull as any
we ever found on Main Street. We leave next week with delight at being
in our own home, if only for two months. I am in the throes of finding
a governess for Wells. Fancy forty-four applicants in two days.

I am sorry to bother you about the suburban house books, but if
Hal will write books of accurate realism

Sincerely and gratefully,
Grace Lewis

Cornwall, July twentieth
Dear Mr. Harcourt:

Hal is Babbitt-ing away furiously in another room, and so I am
answering for him your letter of the third, which came yesterday. Our

1 Grace Lewis was accustomed to addressing her husband as Hal, though he was
known among his friends as Red and sometimes Harry. Not to be confused with
Harrison Smith, also called Hal.

[1921] 79

chief answer is congratulation on your great success not Main Street
alone, but on your incredible achievements of the last two years. It is
wonderful for us to feel that you are OUR FIRM as well as our pub
lishers.

I hope you like Kennebago as much as we like Cornwall. I wonder
which of the three cottages we lived in is now yours. We used to get so
tired of the "chops, steak, ham, bacon or eggs," but how we should love
to have a waitress say that to us now. Soggy bacon, undrinkable coffee,
everlasting unseasoned joints, junkets and stewed fruits, all served to an
accompaniment of formal clothing and formal speech. The only redeem
ing culinary feature is the shameless bar which crowds our table, and
beloved bottles of some of Heinz s 57, which we traveled ten miles to
get. On the other hand, the scenery is as lovely as anything around Ken
nebago, plus the enchanting thatched villages with fourteenth-century
churches upon which one is always stumbling, or fishing villages snug
in deep coves, with ample teas of thick cream and jam and "splits."

Hal works all morning and an hour or so in the afternoon. Then we
walk or drive or swim, all the time talking Babbitt. We have just finished
struggling over the names of the other male characters. And Hal has
made the most astonishingly complete series of maps of Zenith, so that
the city, the suburbs, the state, are as clear as clear in Hal s mind. We had
such fun making the plans of and furnishing Babbitt s house.

Our very best Maine and Cornwall love to you three.

Grace Lewis

Cornwall, July 27
Dear Ellen:

Tomorrow evening we leave here for Kent. I am, with enough walks
and swims to keep in beautiful shape, working all the time now on the
next novel, Babbitt. It seems to be going beautifully.

Hopp6, the English photographer who was over in America last spring
and who photographed a lot of American authors, has been trying to get
hold of me both for his own collection and for the English Bookman.
Just before I left London he snapped me. I am sending you some prints
of the result. I doubt if I am likely to get anywhere a much better pic
ture for newspaper use than the one with the tortoise spectacles. If Har-
court and you agree on this, why don t you hold this one and use it for
the Babbitt publicity next year? Certainly I like it much better than the
other two poses the standing one and the one with face between hands.

If you use the one with face between hands, don t use it except with

80 BABBITT

some very highbrow or new-thoughty sort of magazine as, tho it is in
teresting, the well-known young author looks quite mad in it.

I do most awfully hope you re not getting too bored having to do
things for me (for us!). Babbitt and I have only you, and H.B.&Co. in
general to depend on while we re abroad. Yes, I want some other things!

Grace wrote you a few days ago asking you to get me one or more
books giving plans, pictures, technical terms, etc. regarding the kinds of
houses which Babbitt would be likely to buy and sell in suburbs and in
residential sections far out in cities. There s also several other things I
need, and which I wish you could send me as quickly as possible: (i):
The last copy of System; (2): The last American; (3): The last two or
three Saturday Evening Posts (you ll probably be able to get only the
very last) ; (4) : The last three or four copies of Printer s Ink.

5 & 6 are trickier: I d like one or more of these pompous pamphlets
or books which big N.Y. advertising agencies get out telling in phrases
of pseudo psychology about their magnificent service. The more high-
falutin "psychology" in them, the better. You might be able to get these
by writing to several ad agencies asking them for whatever literature
they are publishing about their service, etc.

(6) : There is published, I think in N.Y. by the Realty Records Com
pany, a thing called the Record and Guide, containing not only records
of mortgages etc. but also real estate gossip and tips, which is what I
want. If there is one, with such gossip, and it isn t too bulky, please send
me a copy or two, probly two.

Please thank Mr. Harcourt for his two letters received in last few
days. This will have to serve as letter to him, this week. At least it will
show that I m alive and kicking, and good and busy with Babbitt, Tell
him I quite understand his opinion of Sir Ernest. Terribly glad you now
have quieter office on second floor. Lots of luck!

As ever,
S.L.

The Bell House
Bearsted, Nr. Maidstone
Kent
August 3
Dear Alf :

It was bully to have your letter from Kennebago. Lord I m glad you
had the rest there! We re more than happy here charming house, perfect
English maids, lovely old village and country lanes, woods, fields of
hops and wheat, pastures, and the slopes of the North Downs for climb-

[1921] 81

ing and for views, I m really working hard from about 9 A.M. to 4:30,
then tea brought into the gracious drawing room by the deftest and
prettiest of maids, then off for a good tramp. So far I ve been planning
planningplanning, in the greatest detail none of it wasted and in
about two more days I ll start the actual writing, and be all finished, ms
ready to deliver, before the first of next April, even with a bit of traveling
in between. I ve written just a little of the actual text, and both it and the
plans seem corking.

If I meet Katherine Mansfield of whom you write I ll make love to
her for you, but I m really of extraordinarily little use to you here I m
seeing, in Cornwall and Kent, nothing of literary people or publishers;
and while I may encounter some here, I rather doubt it and Babbitt
won t let me run up to London very often, if at all.

I m more than rejoiced to hear that you will be coming over, and
think you are very wise to plan to see more of writers than of publishers.
About meeting you: Probably, tho not necessarily, we ll go to Italy
when we leave here, about October ist, and, after a week of Paris and
a week of Venice, settle down at Lake Maggiore, and stay firmly put
till I finish the book. (That place appeals both because of its beauty and
because Claude Washburn will be there and would be useful to us, as
he knows Italian and knows people, and is more than eager to do any
thing he can for us.) I don t suppose you d be coming till after that.
Well, I d join you in London, or in Paris. But why wouldn t it be nice
for you to come down to Maggiore where, in more leisure than we d
ever have in a city, we d talk, walk, look over Babbitt plans and ms and
every evening get- reasonably mellow on Italian wines and MANY small
brandies? We d have a corking time and one to the advantage of Babbitt.
What yuh think?

Apparently Main Street the play is going to go. You probably know
by now that it was tried out by Stuart Walker s stock company in In
dianapolis. I send clippings. But it s better than the clippings because,
judging by Harriet Ford s letter received this morning, the company had
only abt four rehearsals before putting- it on. Lee Shubert went out to
see it and seemed enthusiastic. 1

You got right! England does make good Americans of us or rather,
not England but the thick English.

I m awfully glad you re going to be able to be more to yourself, in
the new office, and keep yourself for bigger things.

Zever,
SL

1 The dramatization of Main Street by Harvey Q Higgins and Harriet Ford was
presented by the Messrs. Shubert at New York s National Theater October 5, 1921.

82 BABBITT

Bearsted, Kent, August i6th
Dear Alf :

A letter or two from you since I last wrote, and one from Don. No
special news, I think, except that we like this placid old house and village
immensely, that I m hard at it on Babbitt, and that last week I sneaked
off to Paris for three days with Harold Stearns! Great time pure but
wet. Watched Stearns with care, and he isn t half so shaky and drunken
as we said. He s a curious, solid, enduring person, for all his dissipating,
and I think he will have an ever widening future, I m for him.

Fine letter from Edith Wharton. I wrote to her congratulating her
on the Pulitzer Prize and telling her of my long and deep enthusiasm for
her books, and she answers charmingly, with a rather more than good
word for Main Street, She s living near Paris, and we ll see her when we
go thru in early October.

As ever,
Red

Sunday morning, ten-thirty,

September fourth.

Church bells jangling beautifully out of tune.

Grace Lewis is writing this time, because after two days of playing with
Mr. Brace, Hal is working to catch up.

I think Mr. Brace was rather a lonely man that first clay at the Cecil.
So it was a blessedly fortunate thing that he came down to us that very
afternoon, to a home and friends and quiet sleeping and a brisk autumn
day for our motor to Canterbury (which is the fourteenth century un
touched), and just enough sight-seeing, and the final excitement of meet
ing George Bernard Shaw.

No other English notable has so gloriously come upand over our
expectations. Every word he said was quotable, and Hal and I fairly
squirmed with joy over his wit. Mr. Brace will give you, I fancy, all the
details, and perhaps tell you of Hal s astonishing resemblance to Shaw
not at all striking until you begin to compare them feature by feature,
even to the two deep lines on either cheek, like sabre cuts when they
smile. I know Hal will sooner or later buy a fluffy white beard and eye
brows, and a mephistophelian moustache and a foolish little hat like a
child s beach hat, and give an imitation, tho he can t do the soft English
voice with an Irish lilt.

All the laborious, fatiguing, time-exhausting planning of Babbitt is
over and Hal s Corona rattles away all morning in the room above me.

[1921] 83

He seems beautifully sure of what he is doing, and I save him time and
distraction by attending to as much of the mail as possible.

All good wishes,
G.L.

Bearsted, Kent, Sept. 5
Dear Alf :

Two good letters from you just come. "Shall we say 15% after
60,000 and give us $2000 more to spend on ads till spring?" says you.
SURE! And still more for ads, if you want it let s try to keep her going
maybe after the smoke from the Porter-Harold Bell-Lincoln-Curwood
et al. battle, of this early fall, 1 has cleared away, they ll find us marching
right on, and I m for constant insertions thru into spring. So count on
me for any co-operation you wish.

Grace wrote you about Don, etc. He hadn t a devil of a lot of
strength yet, tired easily after much walking, but seemed quite happy
and sound, and increasingly glad to be here. I think he was a little lonely
when he first landed, but we had him down for a couple of days and
that, I think, made him feel at home and eager to go on seeing things.
I know how he was at first first time I ever landed in England, years
ago, I was lonely and scared. I ll see him before the week is over; and
we ll soon have him down here again.

I m working like the devil on Babbitt, and it seems to be going fine.

Far as I can figure out, there was about $52,000 coming to me from
Harcourt, Brace and Co. on August 26. Is that right? I still think you d
better hold all this to my credit, as formerly; and I shan t draw out any
more this year unless it should prove necessary for expenses of running
and that ought not to be more than one thousand dollarsif indeed, with
play royalties probable, I shall take any more from you this year. Next
year or the year after or both I ll do some more investing in bonds etc.
I think I ll wait till I get back to America and talk it over with Jes
and you before I do that.

Our very best! You gotta come over this winter, and come see us

in Italy, and have a DRINK two drinks

As ever, and in some haste, & some
grubbiness of having worked all day,
SL

1 Lewis was referring to the publication in one season of Gene Stratton Porter s
Her Father s Daughter, Doubleday; Harold Bell Wright s Helen of the Old House,
Appleton; Joseph Lincoln s Galusha the Magnificent, Appleton; and James Oliver
Curwood s God s Country, Cosmopolitan Book Corporation.

84 BABBITT

Grace forgot to tell you that I talked to Mary Austin (who took us from
Canterbury over to Herne Bay to see Bernard Shaw) about her showing
HJB.&Co. a novel some day. Houghton has her really original and differ
ent work, and she s much dissatisfied. She says she will; it s left in the
air but with a nice twist toward you-all and you not bound to nuthin! x

Bearsted, Kent, Sept. 10
Dear Alf :

Spent day and a half with Don in town this week. I think he really
enjoyed a bat we sat about Caf6 Royal, me drinking strong waters while
he had just a mouthful of muscatel and listened in on my lurid conversa
tion with Nevinson the artist and his Lady Friends. He ll come down to
us for a day and a half or two days early next week. He s probably writ
ten about Keyncs. I m sorry for any poor dollar-chaser who has to do
business with these money-scorning artists and scholars!

The chief point of this letter is: I enclose a letter from Evelyn Scott,
which please read with attention, then write to her. I have, as you know,
a great admiration for The Narrow House, and while you won t neces
sarily share that, you must understand how really big is her promise.
She will, I think, do novels ten times as good as Narrow House, her first
book; she is, I think, precisely the kind of American youngster with
promise on whom we want to build our fiction list. 2 Luck!

As ever,
SL

When the Lewises left Searsted October first they spent time in London
and Paris before going to Italy, There was no correspondence while they
were en route.

Hotel Eden
Pallanza, Italy
October 18
Dear Alf:

This place is easily the most beautiful I have ever seen. We have
four big rooms, each with good balcony, on top floor; and on all sides
look on amazingly varied vistas of lake, cliff, mountain, island, and towns

1 In the following year Harcourt, Brace published Mary Austin s The American
Rhythm.

2 Harcourt, Brace published Evelyn Scott s Narcissus in 1022 and took over The
Narrow House at the same time.

[1921] 85

either on the lake or fascinatingly perched halfway up mountains. I shall
be back on the job day after tomorrow, and from then on

This two and a half weeks lay-off has been good for Babbitt not
only because of the change but also because I ve thought out some good
things about it during the period made those valuable readjustments in
the general plan which one doesn t always make if he keeps too close
to it for too long. Shall be glad to get back on it.

In Paris I made overtures to Wilbur Daniel Steele for the novels he
is more or less planning. He may some day come over to the true and
righteous party. Hope so. He has big things. 1

Luck!
SL

Pallanza, October 26
Dear Alf :

We re really settled down here; we ve had some good hikes, and I ve
been at work for several days. For a start I ve been reading over minutely
the 70,000 or so words I had written of Babbitt, and it strikes me as the
real thing, with a good thick texture. As always it needs cutting and will
get it! I hope Don will have brought you good reports of it; personally
I think it is, tho very different, as good as Main Street; and usually I can
get some idea of whether there s anything there when I re-read. At least
it s real, seems to me.

We re marvelously situated here. The service is perfect, the food
bully; and tho not as cheap as it might be, last week for everything (in
cluding hotel and food, tips, taxis, several boats including a motor boat
a number of miles down the lake, some cables, extra teas for visitors,
this for four of us) it cost 3000 lire, or about $120!

We went up Monte Mottarone with the Washburns last Monday
and just across the bay are the Ward-Browns W-B is an architect whom
we knew in Washington. So we have enough to keep from feeling lonely.
We have delightful walks, boat rides, and four times a week a lesson in
Italian. And WORK!

Many thanks for your cable on M Sz s birthday. I cabled you Satur
day asking for news about the play if it was still on and haven t heard
yet (Wednesday 9 A.M.). I suppose that s about the ordinary rate of
transmission of cables here noweven in Paris, a man told me, it took
him four days to get an answer to a cable!

Did you read Carl Van Doren s summary of myself and other novel-

x ln 1925 Harcourt, Brace published Wilbur Daniel Steele s novel Taboo, and in
1926 his volume of short stories Urkey Island.

86 BABBITT

ists in recent Nation? I have written him, personally, a friendly but
strenuous protest against his two assumptions: (i), that I am merely a
disciple of Edgar Lee Masters in writing Al.St. --somewhat humorous in
view of the fact that I have never sat down and read Spoon River An
thology, but merely heard parts of it read aloud, and this not till 1917,
whereas I first began to plan M St 1905; and (2) that I have always been
a writer of "bright amusing chatter to be read at a brisk pace." I asked
him if he had read The Job or Our Mr. Wrenn or Trail of the Ha<wk,
or certain short stories which I enumerated; and I hinted, if I did not
say directly, that if he hadn t read these, he had one devil of a nerve,
and he was one devil of a bad critic, to dare to sum me up thus. . . .
You or Spingarn might follow this up by sending him a copy of The
fob and making him read it. ... As this rotten article of his is one of
the first which pretends to sum up all my work, as the Nation is a journal
of some importance, and as Van Doren regards himself us a serious critic,
I think he ought to do something about it. I think he ought to do an
entirely new article about me in the Nation. Think you could get him
to? It would really give him a nice chance to cry "nica culpa" very
prettily . . . and certainly he must change this if he s going to publish
these articles in book form.

In criticizing his criticism, I most carefully and repeatedly said that
I was not maintaining that The Job etc. were necessarily in the least
good; but that they were serious work and not "bright amusing chatter";
and that whether I have been and am a damn bad writer or not, certainly
I have NOT been a tinkling chatterer who was by the mighty powers of
Mr. Masters miraculously converted to seriousness. God! You who went
with me thru plans of The Job and all the restyou know. Get after
Van Doren politely, if you think well.

As I had had some nice polite correspondence with Van Doren be
fore, and been complimentary, I was able to write this protest without
impropriety, I think. . .

On the job!

Our best!

si

Why don t you close with one of the German offers & gamble in the
markslet em pile up there. Like to have it published in Germany.

Pallanza, November 5
Dear Alf and Don:

Your two letters came at once today, and much joy was had thereby.
. . . First, before I forget it: Don t send any more mail to Pallanza. Send

[1921] 87

it again c/o Guaranty Trust Co., London, until you receive a cable from
me. Then start sending to Rome as that will, I hope, be my address for
several months. You see it will begin to be pretty cold up here in a few
weeks, and we probably shan t stay after December ist. We ll go to
Rome and stay there till Babbitt is done and I m ready to start home-
that is, if we like Rome; otherwise we ll probably go to Capri. ... It
may even be possible as there are not many people herethat the hotel
will close before December ist, in which case we ll go to Rome as soon
as it does close.

Been working very hard on Babbitt. I ve now finished about 95,000
words of the first draft, besides reading over, doing a little revision on,
and making a lot of later-to-be-taken-up suggestions on, the first 70,000
words. My guess now is that when finished, it will be between 120,000
and 150,000 words long-i.e. from 60,000 to 30,000 words shorter than
Main Street. I think it s going to be good. It is satiric, rather more than
Main Street; and for that reason I think I hope that the novel after
Babbitt will be definitely non-satiric except, of course, for occasional
passages.

Hope you will have received safely my letter asking you to deposit
for me in Guaranty Trust a new $1500. 1 haven t yet received any money
from the play; and tho I still have almost two hundred and fifty pounds
sterling on this side of the water, I don t want to be caught short. I sup
pose I shan t get any play money for a little time yet.

Weather bully here warm days, cold nights; tho it s dusty, the
mountains are glorious, the lake ever changing, the sunsets as wonderful
as on the prairies. We ve had some good walks, one long bicycle ride
we found ourselves quite at home in the saddle, tho it s six years since
we ve ridden. And one afternoon Claude Washburn and I tramped up a
mountain and had dinner by ourselves afterward.

Confidentially, I don t think C.W. will go much farther than he has
now. He ll keep up to present level. But he lacks a passionate reaction
to daily life.

Letter from Edith Summers Kelley saying that she has actually
started her novel written 20,000 words.

We re all awfully well and happy. We miss only Don s presence,
which we were lucky enough to have in Eng and Paris. We d like to
show him two or three of the lovely islands in the lake here. ... Do
write often it s incomparably my best glimpse of home, your letters.
. . . Our very best! ! ! ! !

SL

88 BABBITT

Rome, November 1 8
Dear Don:

All right sir, I ll give you enough pages to make a dummy right
away, soon as I can get them done. I enclose hints for the artist who is
to do the jacket picture. For I decidedly think that, as we did with Main
Street, we better have a picture on front and, for first several editions,
text all over the back.

I doubt if I d have the Babbitt jacket in exactly the same color
scheme as Main Street. Would look as if we were doing just the same
thing all over again. But / do believe Yd have the actual cloth binding
exactly the same -we ll try to begin to make lines of books, all in that
blue and orange, across library shelves. I know I like to have all my
Conrads in same binding.

About the title: Certainly nothing better than Babbitt has occurred
to any of us. Personally, I like it. It s short, fairly keen: and nothing has
been more successful than names for titles.

Yes, Pallanza proved glorious beautiful, bracing, fine. Algernon
Blackwood was crazy to knock it, in Kent. I think perhaps he had it
balled up with some other place or else he stayed at one of the dull little
hotels down in the town itself, instead of at ours, a half-mile out, on a
lovely point.

Terribly sorry to hear about Mrs. Harcourt. How are you feeling,
yourself? Luck!

As ever,
SL

Grand Hotel de Russia, Rome
November 18
Dear Alf :

I m most terribly sorry to hear, from Don s letter of the first, that
Mrs. Harcourt has been having a rotten time with infected teeth, Will
you please give her my love? Of course she may say that as a soother
of nerves and of teeth my love is a poor specific, but assure her that she
is wrong that it is being eagerly applied for by Russian princesses (now
keeping restaurants), Fascist! leaders (now keeping quiet), and rich
young American ladies come here to study singing or tatting (now keep
ing parrots).

Edna St. Vincent Millay is here, and I m trying to decide whether,
as an agent of the firm, I want to tie her up with a contract. I may be
cabling you about her, before you get this letter, and I may not be. Her
poetry is splendid, and much worth having, and she is planning a novel

[1921] 89

But the devil of it is that she quite definitely plans to make this a novel
that would be sure to be suppressed and she wants enough advance to
live on for four months while writing it! Fm afraid that, not as a pure
author but as a crass publisher, that doesn t attract me so much as it
might.

Luck!
si

Rome, Dec. ist
Dear Alf and Don:

Have your recent good letters sent to Pallanza. No news except
working hard. Like Rome immenselyglorious city, good hotel, enough
people we know. I ll write @ more length when the revision is off my
chest. . . . I m doing it, by the way, with extreme carefulness it may
get itself read with some thoroughness. . . . I m dedicating the book to
Edith Wharton have written her so, & she seems delighted.

Till soon

Red

You re publishing Piccoli s Croce?**- He s here, & I like him & admire
him immensely. . . . Have talked more to Edna Millay re novel, but
she s a Tartar thinks VERY well of herself sweet, young, pretty, & loves
Edna. f . .

December 13
Dear Sinclair:

Wonderful stuff your letter of November i8th and its enclosures!
We all gathered round and read over shoulders, in silence except for fre
quent outbursts of "Jeezz, that s great," "J ust listen to this," and so on.
Really, your descriptions are beyond praise. My memory of what I read
makes me appreciate them especially. Everybody is enthusiastic only
your presence could make us more so!

As for the title, Babbitt suits everybody. Melville Cane 2 says why
don t we call it George F. Babbitt. That is pretty good. The "George"
and especially the "F" mean an awful lot. But I ve decided they mean
too much. Just Babbitt is better because it can mean Babbitts everywhere,
the Babbitt kind of thing, rather than just a character. So it s Babbitt.

This is the last week of the play in New York. It s going on the road
for a long tour of smaller cities. Don t know details. Have been trying to
get hold of Harvey O Higgins, without success so far. The theatrical

1 Benedetto Croce by Rafaello Piccoli, HB&Co., 1922.

2 Legal adviser to the firm and on the board of directors.

90 BABBITT

people are clams as far as giving up any real information is concerned,
An American Play Company man told me they had refused an offer of
$25,000 for movie rights. I don t know whether it s like Caesar and the
Crown. Ellen s written you about the German rights sale. I m holding
their check for 20,000 marks. When it came, it amounted to about $94.00.
Today it s something like $120.00. Hope you don t mind my gambling
with your money! The worst of it is that the results are so modest in
proportion to the number of marks.

All good wishes,
Don

Rome, Dec. 1 3
Dear Alf :

Day before yesterday I mailed you 57 pp., & front matter, of Bab
bitt; hope you get it all right. Reading over part of Bab written at Pal-
lanza, I see where I shall have to cut it a good deal; & I see that, being
inherently more satiric than Main St., Babbitt must not be anything like
so long, or it will be tedious. Indeed, I may keep it down to 100,000 or
110,000 words.

I think I shall make my next novel after Babbitt not satiric at all;
rebellious as ever, perhaps, but the central character heroic. I m already
getting gleams for it; I see it as the biggest thing I ve tackled. . * . We ll
talk it over next spring.

Good letters in yesterday from you & from the office. Merry Xmas!

Ever!
SL

Rome, December 26
Dear Alf:

A good Xmas party @ studio with reasonable amounts of drinks
& dancing & nice Americans & Italians on Xmas Eve; toys for the kid
yesterday an Italian train; a Sicilian wheat cart with oxen; in the bright
afternoon, a long hike thru the Borghese gardens.

All goes well plenty of people but not too many. Don s brother
Ernest (Brace) arrives here in 2 days, & I ve found a pension for him.
We see more of Raffaello Piccoli than of anyone else. He s a corker-
charming, intelligent (very!), amusing. You re publishing his Croce book.
Please give it an extra big boost for me.

Judging by cables, M. St. movie rights are to be sold for $40,000,
out of which I ll get about $9640 & you about $1160. (Rem. Amer. Play

[1921] 91

Co. get 10% on all-drat em!) Play receipts to date have been about
$1660, for my own share including the $1000 advance of last spring. I
see b the papers play is closing in NY & I don t yet know if it s going
on the road.

Hope to God Sue is better. D you know, she and Hastings wd enjoy
a month at this hotel some winter.

Babbitt goes marching on. Hope that by now you ll have rec d the
57 pages sent you on Dec. 1 1. Grace has been reading the ms, all to date,
& seems enthusiastic.

Look! Please send Gene Debs, in Atlanta Prison, a Main Street with
a note saying I asked you to send it to him, & that I hope he will like
Miles Bjornstam.

Awfully glad you ve received & liked catalog stuff, etc. of Babbitt.
Happy New Year. God bless you all!

SL

Rome, Dec. 26
Letter #2
Dear Alf & Don:

Second letter today yr 2 just came in. Two fine packages of books
came via Baker Taylor. Many thanks.

Nothing more doing re Edna Millay s novel; she d already offered it
to Liveright, & he probly accepted.

The enclosed is from some South American paperChile, I believe.
Very laudatory. What about a Spanish translation, especially for So.
America? Look into it. Might be done in Argentine rather than Spain.

I d change that "so honest & so interesting" ad line now. How about
"most discussed book of the last twenty years-and now looks as though
it might be the most discussed book of the next twenty!" And how about
a freak ad quoting German, French, Spanish et al. comments in the orig
inal languages? And This

MAIN STREET
M.D.B.

(still the Most Discussed Book)
M.D.B.

Slove!
SL

92 BABBITT

Rome, Tuesday December 27
Dear Alf :

Today came a letter from Dawson Johnson 1 about material for
French articles on me, I ve sent him a little extra material Numerous
other requests for biographical material made me suggest to Don, in
England, that some time shortly after the appearance of "Babbitt^ there
ought to be a pamphlet devoted to SL like those good little books Doran
got out on Walpole, Swinnerton, et al

It should contain a thorough biographical sketch of SL, written
(and signed) by somebody like George Soule, perhaps, based on material
I ll give him when I return to America; brief accounts of books before
Main Street; extracts from the best reviews etc. of Main Street; some acct
of the circulation of that book, of controversies over it, of the burlesques
on it and the translations of it. Then take up Babbitt wh&t it is, etc., and
hold pamphlet long enough to get in the first good reviews of Babbitt.
Then shoot it out to bookstores, women s clubs, etc. and use it when
clubwomen who want to write papers inquire for data. It might suggest,
in small separate article, the study of both M.S. and Babbitt by clubs,
schools, colleges, etc. Would be illustrated with several snapshots of me
and fambly, and Hopp6 portrait.

We ll talk this over next spring; see if it s advisable. One important
thing is to get just the right person to do the book. Bill Benet, Upde-
graffj and Soule are all possible. Or perhaps it should be someone who
does not know me personally.

Now for this book we ought to have certain material I foolishly
haven t kept either Jane Street or Ptomaine Street. And one of the in
teresting things about the pamphlet would be an account of the Main
Street literature which is already growing up. Later it will be impossible
to get hold of some of these. So will you please get now, and hold in
the office for this purpose the following: Jane Street, Ptomaine Street,
Meredith Nicholson s Man in the Street (is that the title?) with its ar
ticle "Let Main Street Alone," Donald Stewart s Parody Outline of Hr-
tory with its excellent M St burlesque, the Swedish and German trans
lations of MS. when they come along, and any others. And later books
with important references to M.S. And we might quote from several of
the burlesques, to compare them of course besides those in separate
books there s several appeared in papers and mags. But for heaven s sake
gather and hold the above-mentioned books before they disappear as
most of them will! ! ! !

1 Director of the American Library in Paris.

[1921] 93

We might have part of the stuff, especially the biography, run in
the Bookman or some other magazine, during the coming Babbitt inter
est, before using it in pamphlet. Heh?

Love,
SL

On January third Lewis cabled from Rome that he was returning to
America, but that he might stay in London a couple of weeks.

[1922]
Georgian House
10 Bury Street
London, S.W.
January 8
Dear Alf :

You must have been wondering what the devil! I found just because
I do like Rome, and Italy in general, so darn well, and because it was
so agreeable to go on long loafing jaunts that, though I was still working
steadily, I was more than likely to get lazy. Some day I m going back
to Italy and do nothing but loaf and play and dream, but I can t afford
to now till the book is done, so I suddenly decided to jump north, get
some cold and good gray energetic days, either in London or New York.

I half planned to catch the Aquitmia from England on January 28,
but now that I m here, I like it so much, feel so energetic, and have found
at the above address so bully a service flat, that I may stay on here till
late April. One of the several good things about it-I haven t wasted any
time in coming up here because I m now just one stage from New York.

I didn t see any reason why Gracie and Wells should come north,
both because they re so well off there, because G is studying Italian, and
because it may, perhaps, be just as well for me to be alone during the
rest of the time I m working on the book. She may come home with me
in the spring, she may stay over and me rejoin them in Italy. We haven t
decided about that yet. But meantime, here I am in a charming sitting-
room-bedroom-bath with good service, on a quiet yet convenient street,
and though I got to London only day before yesterday, I m already all
unpacked, settled, and on the job. Is there anything I can do for you in
London? Let me know.

Well, here I be, back next door to you, and I ll see you-all before

many months, at least.

J SL

94 BABBITT

London, Jan 15
Dear Alf :

Grieved to hear of Hastings s illness. Hope that by now he s splen
didly well again. Gawd what a year you ve had, between successes &
illnesses!

I m working beautifully here just the right place quiet and charm
ing little flat, & plenty of people after tea time. Have seen Galsworthy,
Walpole, Drinkwater, Geo. Adoore, May Sinclair (I dine with her on
Tuesday), John Cournos, Beatrice Harraden, Wm. Archer, Rebecca
West who is to make me quainted with H. G. Wells, 1 when he returns,
in about six weeks. Doran here haven t seen him yet, but I lunch with
him today. Seen Liveright several times; he s hustling like the devil, &
hints he will bring home some big authors of older firms. Waiting to
hear your reaction to ist 57 pp. hope to God you have rec d them all
right tho I have complete carbon.

Ever!
SL

January 20
Dear Lewis:

Just have yours of January 8th from London. Thinking that you
might be sailing almost any day has been something of an inhibition
about writing to you. When we first got word that you had gone to
London and might come home, of course we speculated on the reason
for your changed plans, but Don and I agreed that it would be just what
you say it is. Bless your heart for your conscience about your work. If
the second-raters who wonder why they don t get first-rate rewards
would only realize the blood and tears that go into a first-rate job,

When I got back from Florida a week ago, I read at once the first
part of Babbitt which you sent over. It is sure enough good as gold. In
fact, I think it is the best thing you have done so far the first chapter
even better than the Prologue you have made out of Babbitt s speech.
I wonder a little about giving away as much of your point of view as
that speech does rather than having it grow out of the development of
the characters as the reader goes along. But we ll get to all that when
we have the whole book and when you are over here.

Sales of Main Street the last six months of last year were 104,000.
It s a comfort to have somebody suggest some new way of advertising

1 Apparently the meeting with Wells which Lewis expected to have the previous
June had not come off.

[1922] 95

Main Street. In the course of the last eighteen months, it has been ad
vertised in every size of every font of type.

I am endlessly glad you are so comfortably fixed in London. I know
just where Bury Street is.

I wonder if anyone has thought to tell you that Harrison Smith is
working for us. He started the first of January; he is responsible for the
preliminary clean-up of the flood of manuscripts that comes in and is
helping me on the advertising. He is an awfully nice chap; I think he
will be happy here and a great comfort.

Ever yours,
Alf

London, January 20
Dear Alf and Don:

Don s letter announcing arrival of first 57 pages just came in, via
Rome, this morning. About cutting the Introduction, we ll see later,
when you-all have read the book as a whole. I have already cut it a
little, and as it so completely sums up certain things in all contemporary
Babbitts, I d want to be pretty sure before cutting it much more. . . .
I think perhaps you re wrong to omit, in the dummy, the dedication to
Edith Wharton, however, because it might arouse interest. But it s an
unimportant matter.

I like it here, am working well, and may stay two or three months
before coming home.

The enclosed two stories from the (American) Smart Set Henry
Mencken sent to me with the comment, "I lately unearthed a girl in
Iowa, by name Ruth Suckow, who seems to me to be superb. She follows
after Dreiser and Anderson, but she is also a genuine original. She is now
at work on a novel" I agree with Mencken that Ruth s work as shown
in the stories enclosed is remarkable lucid, remarkably real, firm, jammed
with promise. I should certainly hasten to query Mencken about her, get
her address, and write to her about the coming novel, in the hope of
getting ahead of Knopf.

Jan. 21, A.M.

Cable this morning from Ray Long. 1 "If you have not closed agree
ment for serial rights next novel would like to negotiate with you." I m
answering: "Sorry serial rights not for sale."

Oh. Had lunch and an afternoon with Geo Doran. He was at his
most charming and you know how charming he can be. Liked him a

1 Editor of Hearst s International Magazine.

96 BABBITT

lot and, best of all, he made no efforts to grab my next novel, thus saving
me a refusal.
On the job!

Luck!
Red.

February 4
Dear Lewis:

Your good letter came this morning. I have read Ruth Suckow s
stories and am writing to her. They are clear and tight. So few of the
new people write well. I wonder what she is writing a novel about.

I have a letter from Cape saying he would like very much to have
Babbitt in England, and that you have intimated that would please you.
It would please us too, I am inclined, however, not to make a definite
commitment now. I should not give the new book to Hodder, He has
been cantankerous about the price, though Lord knows he got it cheaply
enough; after he saw the book was going, he should have taken our sug
gestion of buying a set of plates and printing in England. Cape will prob
ably not pay as much for the new book at the start as some of the older
houses, but like ourselves, he doesn t let a book just drop into the hopper,
and in the long run he would sell more, I think, than anyone else.

I guessed that Ray Long was cabling you about serial rights from
the way he telephoned me asking your address. You may be sacrificing
an immediate bunch of money, but I am pretty sure you are not doing
so in the long run. I believe, too, that Babbitt will be a better novel just
because you know it is not to be serialized.

Yours,
Atf

London, February 4
Dear Alf :

Delighted, couple days ago, finally to hear from you your opinion
of the part of Babbitt sent you*

Alf, why don t you consider making your European trip this spring,
while Fm here? There would be several advantages. You would then be
free to watch Babbitt next fall; second, we could begin to take up Babbitt
together, third, we could have a good party you might stay right here
in the same house. We could go home together, say in May. Think it
over carefully.

As ever,
SL

[1922] 97

London, Sunday February 12
Dear Alf :

The enclosed clipping further bears out my suggestion of the need
for sending out a note about the new novel not being Zenith but Babbitt.
Since people are beginning to want to know about it, we better feed them
a little information. This suitcase story has also persisted, So you might
add something like the following:

A story which has recently appeared in a number of newspapers regarding
the author of Main Street announces: "Shortly before going abroad, last year,
Sinclair Lewis bought a fancy suitcase for his wife. They used it on a weekend
trip up the Hudson and it was stolen on the train. And in it was the manuscript
of Lewis s new novel! The real punch of the tragedy is that Mr. Lewis did not
have a carbon copy."

Aside from the facts that the stolen suitcase was not one but two, that
neither of these fancy suitcases whatever a "fancy" suitcase may be belonged
to Mrs. Lewis but one of them to her mother and the other to Mr. Lewis, that
they were not stolen on a train up the Hudson, U.S.A., but at a station in
London, that in neither of them was there a single word of manuscript, notes,
or any other literary material, that Mr. Lewis always keeps a carbon copy of
everything he writes, and that, finally, when the suitcases were stolen he had
completed only a small part of his new novel, Babbitt, the story is a triumph
of correct detail.

I ve seen this stolen ms story now about six times, so it must have been
used a lot more. Our dear friend Mrs. Dawson referred to it with ex
pectant pleasure the other day. I see she has broken out with frequency
lately. We owe her a lot for her advertising.

I ve been thinking about your comment that the Introduction to
Babbitt }\i$ speech should be queried lest it give away too much of him
to the reader at the start. Well, perhaps it should be cut, as being too
exhaustingly long, but I m not afraid about the giving away part: In the
first place any sophisticated reader would, even without the Introduction,
know pretty much all of Babbitt s ideation before the end of Chapter II;
and second where the surprise is going to come in is that, being so stand
ardized, Babbitt yet breaks away from standards, a little, when the time
comes. And I do think the Introduction, as is, will attract a lot of atten
tion for its portrait of the mind of a man like Babbitt. I like especially the
Chum Frink poem. So let s not be hasty about cutting it. Often, in novels,
these apparently tangential things prove to be the things of greatest value.

I hope to have the first draft done in three more days, and I have done
some revising. The final draft will be longer than I d thought between
120,000 and 145,000 words. Anyway, it will be considerably shorter than
Main Street, and the part I ve recently been writing is much more straight

98 BABBITT

narrative, much less satiric, than the earlier part, so it can run longer than
could all satire.

Will you please send me two books: the Harcourt Short History of
the American Labor Movement by Mary Beard; and the Life of Debs,
written, I think, by David Karstner, and published, I believe, by Liveright?
With them you might include the Stearns Civilization book, 1 and Wash-
burn s novel I should be very grateful.

Feeling fine, like London, working hard, all s well! Love to all.

SL

Still think it would be a great idea for you to come over here this
spring. . . .

London, February 1 3
Dear Ellen:

Many greetings from London. I write to you surrounded by manu
scripts, my sleeves rolled up, my mighty brow beaded with perspiration,
struggling through the last sixteen or twenty years of this damned book.
The roar of the typewriters resounds from my outer office, my office
manager rushes in with stacks of new material. ... At least, that is the
impression you can give to anybody that inquires about it.

Don t you think we had better send to that child out in Italy, Texas,
who is going (and very sensibly, too) to deliver a graduation thesis on
my life and works, some of the earlier masterpieces? If you have any
copies of these earlier books handy you might send them to her especially
The Job and Free Air. If you have lots of them you might send her the
whole bunch.

Bully weather here, just cold enough to make it nice for working,
I hope you have gotten over being frozen to death in New York.

Sincerely yours,
Sinclair Lewis

February 13
Dear Lewis:

Thanks for your notes. You must surely by now have had my letter
saying how much I liked the first part of the book. The first chapter is
better, if possible, than Babbitt s Prologue speech. There is no use saying
anything more about that speech until I have read the whole book. This
is going to be a great book about a man a living, breathing character.
You know that when a novelist has done that, he can quit. If I had to

1 Civilization in the United States, edited by Harold E. Stearns, HB&Ca,

[1922] 99

decide on what I have seen now, I d keep the whole book as the story of
a man, and let it show what it will about big towns, small towns, or civil
ization, or any other damn thing. God bless you, and heaven help you!
If you were where it was handy to do it, you ought to have your life
insured for some round sum until it is finished, both for our sake and that
of your family. That s not such a damn fool idea.

Yours much,
Alf

February 21
Dear Red:

I have thought of coming over for some fun and work with you
before your return, but the upshot is rather in the direction of not coming
unless some further reason arises. We are becoming more and more Amer
ican publishers; we have a heavy contracted-for list for the rest of the
year. Keynes, Strachey, and the other real ones we have from England are
sewed up either by contract or sentiment or something and I have been
thinking that Don and I would stick to our knitting here this year and let
the other boys play abroad. A considerable reason is the development of
our textbook business $10,000 in January, and I d guess there will be
$150,000 or more this year. And that means as much every year for ten
years if we didn t publish a new textbook. When we have a quarter mil
lion of that we are impregnable.

What I d say now would be: You come home about April; let me
read what is done of Babbitt over a weekend; then you and I take my car
and drive to Atlantic City or somewhere, just talking it all over loosely as
we drive. When we get where we are going, stay a week or two and say
all we have to say, lay our plans for advs and for all sorts of things, and
get our heads around it alland incidentally have a damn good time.

Grosset wants Main Street for cheap edition in fall. We ve said a not
too tentative "No." Play opens in Chicago March 5th.

Yours,
Atf

London

Feb 22 and Washington s birthday

but they haven t heard about it here.

Dear Don:

Yes, I think perhaps the type and color-splash jacket is better than a

picture would be. I can understand your difficulties in getting a picture

10 Q BABBITT

that would not limit the appeal. The only other thing would be a portrait
of Babbitt, and that would not be attractive. I ve been looking at the jacket
as you sent it to me, last evening and this morning, and I like it better and
better. Let s go ...

You speak of Strachey and wonder what my impressions. IVe met
him! -at tea at Lady Colefax s. I thought he was singularly unappetizing,
with his watery beard, mild spectacles, and feeble voice. I talked to him
two minutes, informed him what hellish good publishers H.B.&Co. were,
and went my ways, content for to see him no morrrrrrrre, my love,
con-tent for to see-hee him no more! (Try that on your baritone; it sings
very nicely.)

I think that between now and May it would be a good stunt to run
a full-page ad of Babbitt in the Publishers Weekly, announcing it for
publication early in September, and reproducing in one corner our ist
Main Street announcement of a year and a half ago. . . . Gawd, a year
and a half!

All well Grace still in Rome-gets a bit lonely sometimes, but has a
good time and working hard on Italian and French, and saw the new Pope
crowned from a front seat. She says he didn t come down off the sedia
and say anything about Main St, but otherwise the ceremony went off
very well. , . . My plans as to exact date for return are vague, but know
ing me I suspect that sometime between now and May ist I ll suddenly
get fed up with London, grab a ticket, cable, and sail, and have Grace join
me in US instead of waiting for her here. But meantime the work goes
splendidly and otherwise I seem planless.

Best to all
SL

February 27

Dear Lewis:

Congratulations on the note you wrote declining election to the
National Institute of Arts and Letters.

"Said Elmer More to Stuart Sherman,
Let s clean up these younger vermin.
All right, let s; they make me sore,
Said Stuart Sherman to Elmer More."

Though I think Sherman knows good stuff when he sees it-if his eye
isn t cocked over his shoulder at his colleagues when he is deciding
whether or not he ought to be let to like it.

Don t think any more than you have or than you may in the most
passing fashion about what I said about the speech which is the introduc-

[1922] 101

tion to Babbitt. I attach very little weight to my remarks in that direction
as they were based on reading only the 57 or so pages you sent over. My
judgment about that sort of thing isn t worth a damn until I have read the
whole book, if then. After I have read the whole book, if I have sugges
tions to make, I ll make them, as I did about the episode you left out of
Main Street, and then you can be the doctor.

Don t let these literary fellers drain your strength. It s a hell of a hard
job to write as good a novel as the one you are at. If you were here, I d
put you to work in a garage for a few days.

I am thinking about your proposal that I should come over before
you come home. I d sure like to see you. Just now it seems to me it would
be more fun to drive around here for a week or two together than to be
in the thick of things in England.

Ever yours,
Alf

London, March 12
Dear Alf:

You re right about not coming over but seeing me in US, I fancy.
But I can t get there in April. I ought to bring you the novel in something
like final form. I think I still have the ring of the American voice in my
ears all right you must remember that I encounter a fair number of
Americans here I m a damn sight more likely to be having a drink with
the fine chaps from the Guaranty Trust Co than with the blinkin English
writers.

You may expect me, with ms quite or practically ready to set, about
May 1 6th to zoth, and as soon as you go over it, we ll beat it out to the
country and talk it over. Grace will join me here about May ist. One
advantage in her not being here is that I m working practically undis
turbed till dinner time, then get out for a good walk. Another thing about
not returning in April is that it s bad to stop before the ms is something
like all done, because one relaxes and it s hard to go on. I had that experi
ence rather with Main Street, after I came from Washington up to NY
then Maine.

I have your note about A.S.M.Hutchinson. I ll see if he knows when
his book will be published, and I ll say nothing about mine. . . . You
could get Babbitt out even before September 14 if you had full ms by
May 20th, and if there weren t too many changes, couldn t you? I ll try
to hustle out proofs-if necessary come to NY to read them, if I m in the
country at the time.

No, I wouldn t let Grosset have M St for cheap edition for a year or

102

BABBITT

two more, if then. Yes, I d wait yet awhile before tying up with Cape on
Babbitt.

See you in two months! Work going fine.

7 Luck!

Red

March 15

Dear Lewis:

I have just booked passage for Sue and one of our most intimate
friends, Mrs. Dr. (Bill) Slaughter, on the Adriatic for April 8th. Sue has
been gradually coming back to first-rate health, and some time spent
abroad with this lovely old friend will put her on her feet. The plan is
ten days in London; a week around the part of South Germany where
Sue s people came from, near Mannheim; over the Alps and down to
Florence; then back to Paris and so home about the middle of June. I have
suggested that the girls stay at the Old Mctropole while they are in Lon
don, I don t know whether they will arrive before you leave or not. Sue
will have the latest news from us. I wish I could get away, but we seem
to be unbelievably busy. Ellen is just starting for a three-weeks holiday
which she sadly needs, and there are some questions about added stock
room and perhaps moving our quarters and so forth that I hesitate to get
far away from.

We just have the Ersten Almanach from the Volksberband der Buch-
erfreunde, Berlin. It announces Hauptstrasse ws dem Amerikctnischcn,
translated by Dr. Baldorolden. There is an extraordinarily interesting
two-page discussion of the book. x

No time for more today.

Yours,
Atf

London, March 26

Dear Alf :

We shall sail on the Aquiwnm on May 13. I hope to have the ms
with me, all done. I shan t write many letters to you these coming six
weeks be rather more than busy revising. What advance sale do you
expect on Babbitt?
All well! Luck!

Ever,
SL

1 German edition of Main Street.

[1922] 103

During this period before sailing there were only brief business notes-
from Lewis. He and Mrs. Lewis arrived in New York about May 20th,
and after spending several weeks there, Lewis bought a car and drove to
Sauk Centre to see his father, while Mrs. Lewis went to Fishers Island,
New York.

FOUR

A Reputation Established

[1922]

Sauk Centre, Minn., July 9
DearAlf:

Good trip grand car (4 passenger Cadillac in a fetchin beige) find
my father well. I ll be here for a week more, then to Chicago via St. Paul.
I am meekly bored here not aggressively. The town far from resenting
M. St. seems proud of it.

I m sending for your fall use two pictures made of me in Madison.
The one at typewriter seems to me a corker.
Lemme know how things are going.

Luck!
SL

July 19
Dear Sinclair:

In accepting our proposal for Babbitt, Cape says: "I think that I shall
print a glossary at the end of the book, and very likely ask Hugh Walpole
to write a foreword; this will be good advertising. You might let me know
what Lewis thinks of these two suggestions."

Cape says, by the way, that he thinks the book stands a very good
chance in England, and that we have a good chance of selling almost as
many copies as of Main Street.

It has been hot and busy in the office since you left. I hope both your
father and you have enjoyed your trip.

Faithfully yours,
Don

[1922] 105

The Blackstone, Chicago
July 22
Dear Don:

Your special delivery t j hand. Yes, I think Cape s idea of a glossary
might be a good idea if he can get a good man to do it. Yd like to see
proof on it before publication. . . . A,nd bully to have introduction. Tell
Cape that if he can t get Walpole, he might try the following: Wells,
Galsworthy, May Sinclair, Somerset Maugham, Compton Mackenzie. 1

I rather doubt our living in either Madison or St. Paul-too cramped,
both. Gracie arrives from the East this afternoon & we ll talk it over.
I RA-ther think we ll start motoring East next Tuesday.

Lecture @ University of Chicago last evening; afterward a some
what spirituous party with Ed Morehouse, Brett Stokes 2 & coupla others-
very sunny & salubrious. Luck!

Ever,
SL

July 22
Dear Sinclair:

Had a rush visit from your wife yesterday and I hope that by now
you are safely reunited. I am sending you copies of some correspondence
we ve had with the Babbitts. In both cases I have consulted a lawyer be
fore replying. The B. T. Babbitt matter is entirely safe. I think we are in
no danger from George F. either, though of course the man can bring an
action if he thinks he has cause, but our lawyers think that he would be
unable to prove any damage and I hope my reply to his letter will allay
his fears. I hope we don t hear from a George F. Babbitt who has a wife
called Myra and who is in the real estate business!

I will send you an advance copy of Babbitt as soon as you have an
address that seems to offer time enough to be sure of its getting into your
hands. We are trying to guard the copies carefully.

Faithfully yours,
Don

1 When the British edition of Babbitt appeared it had a three-page introduction
by Hugh Walpole and about 125 American expressions "glossarized."

2 Edward Morehouse, salesman for Harcourt, Brace; Brett Stokes, son of Fred
erick A. Stokes and salesman for Frederick A. Stokes Company.

106 BABBITT

Chicago, July 22
Dear Don:

Grade, just arrived hot and dusty but safe, tells me of the possible
trouble with Mr. George F. Babbitt of Boston regarding the name of Our
Hero. If you have to do anything, why don t you do this: Make him an
offer to put in each copy of the book a slip (not attached, simply slipped
in) to this eff ect, say:

The author and publishers of Babbitt regret to learn, just as the printing
of the first edition of the book is completed and changes are therefore im
possible, that the name George F. Babbitt is the same as that of an important
Boston journalist. They both avow that the similarity was unintentional and
regret the coincidence. With the millions of people in the world, it is impos
sible to choose any name for a fictional hero without the chance of its corre
sponding to the name of some real person, and the author & publishers do most
earnestly assert that in choosing the name George F. Babbitt, the author was
unfortunately unaware of the identity of the real Mr. Babbitt, a journalist of
standing.

(Signed) Sinclair Lewis

Harcourt, Brace and Co.

OR something of the sort, to be OK J d by your lawyer. AND should you
make this offer keep more than one copy of the letter for possible use in
any suit or injunction hearing.

Look. Gracie and I will be here till some time Tuesday. You should
have this before then. Please wire me if there seems to be any difficulty,
and lemme know what you want me to do.

Ever,
SL

Chicago, Tue July 25
Dear Don:

I think we ll be off, tomorrow or next day. Here are some thoughts
on the GFBabbitt of Boston case, in case it should chance to become
serious, which might be of value. You might turn them over to your
lawyer:

We can deny that the name of the hero of the novel is the same as
that of the Boston man! The name of the novel character is given, specif
ically, emphatically (see chapter near end-scene at Boosters Club meet
ing), as George Follansbee Babbitt, whereas the Boston man s name is
George F (discover his middle name) Babbitt. Furthermore (and this
is at least as important in identification as is the name), George Follansbee
Babbitt is a real estate man of an imaginary city called Zenith, a city of a

[1922] 107

type obviously very different from Boston; while George F Babbitt is
a journalist of Boston.

And suppose the name in the novel were changed to (say) George
F. Brown. There probably, there certainly are many George F. Browns
among the 110,000,000 people of the U.S. there are two of them in the
Chicago phone book alone. Any of these people could then demand that
the changed name be changed again, till finally it would be impossible to
issue a novel with named characters at all! For there is no possible name
for a fiction character which will not have a resemblance, real or imagined,
to that of some actual person. Yet certainly all laws and customs, univer
sally, do permit authors to give names to characters, interfering only when
it is PROVEN that by INTENT the author means to indicate and INJURE some
specific real person. And in this case the proof seems to be that the author
is honest in his contention that not only did he not mean to refer to the
real Mr. George F Babbitt of Boston, but that actually he had never
heard of that person till this case arose.

Mr. Babbitt of Boston shows prejudice by presupposing that some
injury may be done to him by the use of this name in the novel: he must
PROVE that actual injury HAS been done to him. Actually it might as well
be advocated that Mr. Babbitt, of Boston, is likely to receive large adver
tising and attention which will be of great value to him as a journalist
(whereas he is known only locally, the fictional Babbitt will be, indeed is
even before publication, known nationally and even internationally!).
Therefore the publishers might, with as much reason and justice as Mr.
Babbitt of Boston, claim from him payment for this invaluable free adver
tising!

I m NOT really worried about this at all, but I do believe that it s just
as well to take precautions, to be READY, in case Mr. Babbitt of Boston,
obviously an agitatable person, tried to get an injunction or something
which would delay the important date of publication.

Ever,
SL

Broadway Inn
Geneva, Ohio
Friday

Dear Don:

East ard bound! Ran into Geo. Horace Lorimer in Chicago, & again

this morning in Toledo. Ast him if offended people whose names happen

to be the same as characters in a story often write him. Frequent, says he;

he answers with a good stiff reply that the circumstances surrounding

108 BABBITT

the story-hero show clearly that he is not the same as the real person;
& this, Lorimer says, usually closes the incident.
Fine easy tug.

Ever,
SL

After exploring the possibility of renting a house in Madison or St. Paul,
the Lewises decided on Hartford, Connecticut. Mid~August they found a
house near the golf club. While living in Hartford, Lewis visited New
York frequently.

25 Belknap Road,
Hartford, Connecticut
September third.
Dear Alfred Harcourt:

After reading the Stuart Sherman essay, 1 I should have kicked off
two slippers, except that kicking off one is more effective. As the eight-
year-old wife of Sinclair Lewis, I bear witness to the exceptional, and
true, understanding of Hal in this article. It is just as right as right can be,
except possibly the influence of B ovary, 1 don t think Hal had read
Bovary until after Main Street was finished. But I am not sure. Of course,
I love the impressive seriousness with which Mr. Sherman dissects Hal s
work.

And how wise of you to get out the booklet at once. Hal may be in
your office as you are reading this note. So I shall retain this manuscript.
Do come up soon. Come back with Hal, if you can. Aren t you really and
truly thrilled about September fourteenth? 2
On with the dance!

Grace Lewis

t September n
Dear Red:

What news there is is good. Doc Smyth a telephoned that he has a
fine review from May Sinclair. McLeod 4 has telegraphed for 2500 more
Babbitt for Canada. I ll have the total of the advance orders the end of the
week, and let you know exactly what s the upshot of all the fuss. You
know that my guess is 200,000 before New Year s.

1 The Significance of Sinclair Lewis, HB&Co., 1922.

2 Publication date of Babbitt.

8 Clifford Smyth. Editor of New York Times Book Review.

4 George J. McLeod, Ltd., Canadian agents for Harcourt, Brace.

[1922] 109

I had a mean cold and stayed home most of last week after you left.
It gave me a chance to read The Job at leisure. There is a good deal in it
you will never be ashamed of. There are a lot of women who have come
on since 1917 who will "love" that book. Except for a little airing of your
private views here and there, I didn t let go of it until Chapter XIII. From
Chapter XIII the book wants to be pointed a little more toward the job
and a little less toward Una s life outside the job and S.L. s ideas toward
life in general.

Hope you like the new home.

Yours,
Alf

September 13
Dear Red:

Yesterday I read some of a manuscript which had rather full refer
ences to Disraeli and his political novels, and recalled Henry Adams and
his Democracy. All this made me realize that there had been no really
good serious novel of Washington national and international life for the
forty years since Democracy was published. How about casting your eye
that way for a theme? A real and honest picture. Of course there can be
a woman in it with at least a promise of what women may mean in polit
ical life. Perhaps the action might be mainly confined to the U. S. Senate.
If you don t write that book sometime, Grace will. It would be a great
stunt to have that job done right once, and the international audience
would be large.

Upton Sinclair sends us a carbon of his Appeal to Reason review.
It s bully. Maurice x of the Herald phoned that Owen Johnson s review
was so good that if I didn t acknowledge it was the best review of Babbitt
he d buy me a lunch. It s lining up just right. You ll have them all flopping
to get right side up first by next Monday. There has been just enough
silence, delay, knocks, soft answers, and enthusiasm to catch the press part
just right. Right-o! Stay home, take it easy, and keep quiet.

200,000 before Christmas, Son! It s a damn good book. Nuf sed.

Ever yours,
Alf

Harcourt kept Lewis informed of sales, reviews, etc.> in this period imme
diately folio-wing publication of Babbitt, and there ^ere brief letters in
return from Le*wis.

i Arthur Bardett Maurice, literary editor of the New York Herald.

110 BABBITT

Hartford, Sept. 26
Dear Alf :

Herewith important tidings. I enclose authorization for you to close
Babbitt movie deal at $50,000. If it prove, later, that we can t get this, I ll
make out new authorization at a lower sum.

I enclose a letter from Clifford Smyth. I wonder if you couldn t quote
this; I think he might consent. And, most important, copy of a letter from
H. G. Wells. Do you want to cable asking him to reply collect whether
he d be willing to let us quote it? He might not be but, a la Galsworthy
with Main Street, he might be willing to give us a few words to quote.
Use your judgment about this, only don t quote without getting per
mission. I fancy Wells is (very properly) touchy.

I m very grateful to you for your work on movie rights. Oh. Better
send a copy of Wells s letter to Cape. And have you sent him the May
Sinclair review from the Times?

I ll be in NY some time about October 8, on my way West to lecture.
I don t believe it s really necessary for me to be there to wind up negoti
ations with Warner Bros., but if you should need me of course I ll come
on the jump.

Ever,
SL

Hartford, Sept. 27
Dear Alf:

Here s a chance for a couple of big books. Mrs. W, S. Cowles, of
Farmington, Conn., wife of retired Admiral Cowles, and sister of Theo
dore Roosevelt, has what is probably the most complete collection of
Roosevelt letters extant. She seems to have been his favorite sister. The
letters extend from before he went to college till within a week of his
death. They give a complete view of the man and his times. She is think
ing of having them edited (to leave out certain purely personal para
graphs) and published. I m sure we could get them. She knows and is very
fond of Hal Smith whose uncle, Winchell, lives in Farmington, If you re
interested, you d better send Hal up to see her and make arrangements.
She d probably have unpublished Roosevelt pictures also,

Also, by coincidence she has something else equally interesting the
diary of a little Cowles girl kept from 1797 to 1802, still in her hand
writing. It gives a marvelous view of the customs of the day it s unusu
ally frank. She wrote it in the same house in which the Cowleses now
live, a fine old house with lovely rooms, and the book would be illustrated
with views of the house and other houses, hills about, etc. as mentioned

[1922] 111

in the diary. Hal could take care of this also. Talk it over with him.
I think it s a double chance.

Ever-
SL

September 27
Dear Red:

Wallace Munro has had me on the phone on and off for the last
forty-eight hours on the dramatic rights of Babbitt. I have heard of him
as the producer of Faust and such, and he refers to Winchell Smith. Hal
Smith says you can get W. Smith on the telephone at his home in Farm-
ington, or drive out and see him and find out about this man. What shall
we do about this sort of thing? You see you have written a great book,
and these marginal rights are going to be sought after by folks who recog
nize what is in the book. The sale of the book is going to head it all up
rapidly. It may all get settled before you go off on your lecture. But if it
should not, I think it is important that someone easily accessible should be
able to do the business.

I am getting a clear notion that there is a chance for Babbitt to be an
extraordinary success in England. The reports of you have made your
name familiar all over the place, and you can be sure the book that has
the backing of such people as Wells and May Sinclair and Cape accord
ing to contract with money to spend on it is apt to get away to what
ever market there is for such a book in England. It may be rather large,
especially at a time when they realize it is important for them to under
stand what sort of folks Americans are.

I have not been unmindful of your suggestion that we drive up for a
weekend at Hartford. It would be great fun. I have been hoping we could
do it, but Ellen Eayrs is on a three-weeks business trip out West, and we
are unbelievably busy. So I can t make promises to get away early on
Saturdays. Also I am afraid the trip would be more than Sue is up to just
yet, although she is improving. I am not working so killingly hard as a
year ago, but while there are so many irons in the fire in so many direc
tions, I find questions every few minutes that only I can answer.

Babbitt re-orders are beginning to come in. We can t tell for sure
whether it is a forced sale from the reviews and advertising, and your
reputation, etc., or whether there is a spontaneous comeback from people
who have reafl the book and told other folks about it.

Yours,
Alf

H2 BABBITT

Hartford, Thursday Sept 28

Dear Alf :

My feeling is that it s folly to have Babbitt dramatized at all, because
then the manager, the dramatists, and everybody else who isn t busy rob
bing someone else dips into the movie rights, and in the long run, as
happened with Main Street, I actually lose by having the thing dramatized
instead of just selling movies from the book. If Munro or anybody else
wants to buy drama AND movie rights together for, say, $60,000, cash
money, due January 2, 1923, on note signed by financially responsible
persons, they can have em. Ask Munro why he doesn t combine with
some movie company in making such a gamble. And actually I d take
$50,000 for drama and movie rights combined, and then not have to do
any more fussing and rowing about it.

I m quite willing to stand behind you if you make any reasonable
bargain on my behalf only remember that if the book is to be sold as a
play, I will not give up one cent of movie money to the manager or any
body else. About that I m going to be hoggish. If it s worth anything to
them as a play, then there s no reason why they SHOULD have anything on
the movies. If it s not worth anything as a play, why should they want it?

I think I ll come down to New York next Monday and stay over
night, and then we can take up together whatever has come up.

I have a note from Hugh Walpole, who is staying at the Waldorf.
I m sure you could get a nice blurb about Babbitt from him. In his note,
he says merely that he likes it better than Main Street. A word from him
would be of value now, when he is starting off lecturing. He leaves Satur
day, so nail him quick.

Luck!

si

If Bab has a chance for English success, Cape ought to buy M. St. now.
Suggest it.

September 29
Dear Red:

Through some unaccountable quirk of reticence, I don t like just to
blow in or write Hugh Walpole for something we can quote about Bab
bitt. He is apt to do so incidentally in an interview or article soon, and
then we can quote him that way.

I agree completely that you should keep the dramatic and the movie
rights of Babbitt separate. I wish you had done it with Maih Street.

Yours,
Alf

[1922] 113

Lewis went to New York on October 2nd, stayed overnight, and returned
to Hartford. He left Hartford again in time to keep his first lecture date,
which was in Detroit on October 22th. There was no correspondence
while he was lecturing, and Lewis s next letter to his publishers was dated
November 6th.

Hartford, Nov 6
Dear Alf :

Note Canby s letter enclosed. If you d like, he d probably let you
quote it or, better, he d probably write something more quotable to the
same effect about Bab sticking to his ribs some time after reading it.

Walpole writes me that St. John Ervine writes him from London that
it looks as though his Cathedral and my Babbitt would be THE two books
of the season in London. As I recall, it s one hell of a time since any
American book has been a "the" book in England.

Ever,
SL

Hartford, Nov. 9
Dear Alf:

Gracie has been reading The Job & is strongly opposed to our repub-
lishing it. First (says she) it is in so many places amateurish that rewriting
wouldn t save it, and more important, everything in The Job has been said
again, & better, in M. St. & Babbitt everything except Mother-and-
daughter. What you think? I d hate to have us damned by a fluke here.

SL

Hartford, November 10
Dear Don:

J. Henry! This man Feipel 1 is a wonder to catch all these after
rather unusually careful proofreading not only by myself and my wife
but also by two or three professionals at Quinn s! You ought to hire him
to go over page proofs. But NOT to make all the corrections he wants to,
because he too falls down. It gives me a devilish pleasure, after he has so
adequately got the goods on me, to get em on him. E.G. Bertrand Shaw
is, of course, an intentional error; and I see no reason why rathskeller
should be capitalized, even though it would be, as a noun, in German.
(Gawd, Feipel has me nervous about hyphens!)

1 Louis N. Feipel, of Brooklyn, New York, who made a hobby of proofreading
already-published books.

114 BABBITT

Yes, "areoplane" is facetious and "lisped in blueprints" is all right,
though when it gets queried it doesn t sound so DAMN humorous.

There s another correction-the one pointed out in Keith Preston s l
column-page 121 "I tip my benny to him" is wrong-benny means over
coat. But whatnell is hat? Is it kelly? Or kelley? I wish you d call up
F.P.A. about this, and change in accordance with his decision-he s very
accurate about slang.
Oh Gawd.

Yours for light beers and wines,
Or would Feipel make it yours for
beers and light wines, or beer and
light wines, or light wines and beer,
or light wines and beers, or light
wine and beer, or light wine and
beers or
Gawd!
SL

Hartford, Nov 1 3

Dear Alf :

I think that, if you wished, Zona Gale would let you quote from her
letter, or write you something else to quote.

I wish you d have Hal Smith take you out with Charlotte Dean to
lunch, and see what job you think she d be qualified for, if she hasn t yet
got one since leaving Harper s. She has a corking mind and personality;
she ought to be of value; and she knows how to write publicity.

Ever,
SL

November 14
Dear Red:

By now you have two sets of our edition of the earlier novels. They
look pretty good to me, and when I saw them in a row, I had the clear
hunch that the thing to do was to sell what we could of them as is to such
as want them. This jibes with Grace s notion that it would be unwise to
revamp The Job. The crudities in it will not work against your reputation
if it is let out onto the market as an earlier book while your rep will get
full credit for the mother and daughter portion and the many other

1 Columnist and critic on the Chicago Daily News.

[1922] 1 15

honest pieces in it. Revamping it would mean rewriting it quite seriously,
and you could do a new novel with pretty nearly the same amount of
effort. The thing for you to do about all these questions is what you are
ripe to do and what you want to do. If you want really to rewrite this
book, we ought not to let it out any farther than we have to in its present
form; if you don t want to, we might as well have what money there is in
these earlier books as earlier books. I shouldn t be surprised if we should
sell twenty or thirty thousand as they are.

I didn t know that Charlotte Dean was out of Harper s. There isn t a
ghost of a chance for her here. We have a big and rather expensive staff
now; thank heaven, it deserves to be expensive. It handled $118,000 busi
ness last month without a crack which is at the rate of a million and a
quarter a year. That means we have too much of a crowd for the inevi
table $50,000 months, and we must not expand until we are permanently
on something more than a million dollar basis. Also we haven t room for
any decent or indecent person to sit in these quarters and we won t have
new quarters until next summer.

Yours,
Alf

Hartford, Nov. 15
Dear Alf:

The two sets of your edition of the earlier books have come. They
look corking much better than in original format. Yes, I think I d better
not rewrite any of them; do what you can with them as earlier books.
Next spring we might advertise them just a little. Eh?

Ever
SL

November 17
Dear Red:

Warner, the President of Warner Brothers, is going to Chicago this
afternoon, but he has paid $2500 to bind the bargain, and his lawyer and
Melville are going ahead to clean up the contract (for Babbitt).

So the sale is made. Warner raised the question of dramatic rights
yesterday, saying that he might want to buy them also because he was
thinking of beginning to produce plays, because he thought there was a
good play in this, and because he did not want his large investment in
rights and the picture jeopardized by what someone else might do with

116 BABBITT

the play. I told him I thought if he offered a satisfactory contract with
some moderate sum down that you would be inclined to play along with
him on the understanding that if the play was not produced within two
or three years, the rights would revert to you and you would keep the
advance.

Yours,
Alf

Hartford, Nov, 22
Dear Alf:

Gracie and I will come down to NY about December 7 and spend a
week or ten days in town on a bat, especially theaters and trying to keep
HB&Co from getting any work done.

Yuh, I AM thinking about the next novel a lot it s ripening slowly
but I hope it ll be the real big thing when it belooms.

Ever-

SL
What do you think of a de luxe M. St. & Babbitt @ $5 for Xmas 1923?

November 23
Dear Red:

Miss Cuff from Don s office has just brought the Harper contracts to
me for Our Mr. Wrenn, The Trail of the Hawk, and The Job, asking if
the provisions in those contracts are to apply to our editions. It seems to
me simpler to propose one new contract for these three books on our
form. I would suggest 10% to 10,000 and then 15%. The reason for the
10% is that we are beginning to plan a considerable advertising campaign
on the old books in connection with "Babbitt the first of the year, and this
will give us a contribution of a thousand or two thousand dollars toward
that expenditure. One thing I think we should certainly want to do would
be to reprint about 50,000 of the Sherman pamphlet, of course in some
what cheaper form, and distribute it widely. There ought to be a good
deal of trade and considerable newspaper publicity. I had a talk yesterday
with the Ladies Home Journal people about their use of Babbitt and Main
Street as premiums next spring. This should do a good deal toward spread
ing interest in the old books, Will you let me know what you think of all
this?

Yours,
Alf

[1922] 117

Hartford, Nov. 23 (obviously misdated)
Dear Alf:

Yes, I think it would be well to prepare new contracts for Job
WrennHawk. I should think the proper royalty would be 10% to
25,000 or 35,000, starting at parthat is, as though no copies at all had
been sold by Harper s; with movie, dramat & serial rights as in Babbitt
contract (& maybe radio!! rights on somewhat same basis!). I think 10%
only to 10,000 as you suggest wouldn t allow you enough for advertising.
At the proper time, show Our Mr. Wrenn to Warner for movie. It
has a chance. The "proper time" may not be till next year.

Ever
SL

In the next month the correspondence between Lewis and the office had
to do mainly with closing the Babbitt motion picture deal with Warner
and with the idea that Lewis might write a biographical sketch of himself
for publicity purposes. Lewis and his wife came to New York on Decem
ber $th and stayed at the Chatham -for about a week. Harcourt left before
Christinas for a Florida vacation.

Hartford, December 22
Dear Don:

Alf wanted me to write a sketch of the life of that interesting young
writer S. Lewis, to be sent out in answer to requests for material for
women s club papers, etc. Here it is.

Alf thought that four printed pages, about 1200 words, would be
long enough. In my version it comes out 2600, which is cut from an
original 3200 or so. It seems to me that all of it has some interest and that
perhaps you d better use the whole thing. What do you think? You might
send it down to Alf. As it will probably be quoted a good deal, Alf and
you and Hal Smith ought all to look it over, that nothing too indiscreet
may get by us in it. If you send it to Alf, explain that it came out this way
and I believe it d better all go. 1 200 words is too short to give anything
but a few statistics regarding a life of unusual nobility, courage, beauty,
tenderness, wit, scholarship, and bunk.

Merry Christmas!

Ever,
SL

I ll hit NY either Jan. 2 or very early on the 3 d-I sail the afternoon, of
the 4th.

ARROWSMITH

FIVE

The Scientist as a Hero

In December 1922^ through a casual meeting in New York with Paul de
Kruif, a young man of science, Lewis s old idea, a novel founded on the
famliar practitioner of his youth, suddenly grew into a vastly more
significant theme. Within twenty-four hours after he had met De Kruif,
Lewis had sketched out roughly the outline of his novel One part was to
deal with the conquest of the plague on a tropical island. A trip to the
West Indies would furnish a good means of beginning his researches, and
Lewis thought that Paul de Kruif, who had recently left the Rockefeller
Institute, was the one mm to help him. In Jammy 192^ Lewis and De
Kruif started for Barbados.

[1923]
S, S. Guiana
Wednesday, Jan. 10
Dear Don:

The hills of St. Thomas (Virgin Islands) are ahead-well be in there
this noon and I ll mail this letter. We ve had perfect weather; not one bad
day. Rather dull bunch of passengers, but we haven t minded, for Paul
and I have been working like the devil and, I think, with success. The
Barbarian looks bigger and bigger, better and better (every day nevery
way), and Paul and I find we can work together perfectly. Each day I
have greater respect for his totally unusual and fine though fiery brain.
. . . Btheway, you might add on our contract "novel provisionally called
The Doctor or The Barbarian" We have worked like the devil every day
since we ve sailed, and the plan is becoming complete.

I wish Alf and Hal and Gus and you were along-we re sailing
through seas of the most tropic blue you can imagine. I doubt if I shall be
able to get any mail till we reach England-probably about March first to
fifteenth.

122 ARROWSMITH

God bless you all! You might send this down to Alf , with my love to
him and Sue as it goes to you and all the office.

Ever,
SL

Marine Hotel
Barbados, B.W.I.
(undated)

Dear Alf and Don:

I leave here today on the Crynssen of the Royal Netherlands West
India Mail line for a round of the Spanish Main, touching back here on
February 21 and I hope to find a lot of mail from you, sent in care of the
Marine Hotel and then on to England, arriving there March 6.

The trip has been perfect; we ve seen a lot of lovely islands, met a
bunch of interesting people, and the work is going superbly. The novel
expands and takes on new life each moment. I am quite sure that it will be
much better than either Main St or Babbitt; the characters have more life
to me, more stir. De Kruif and I have proved to be able to work together
perfectly he is not only a damn clever man but the Rock of Ages.

I ll send you a few cards along the way. Love and kisses.

Ever,
SL

Hartford, January i6th
Dear Don Brace:

Just received a cable from Hal in The Barbados. It reads thus: "Going
around Caribbean. Return Barbados February 2ist on way to England.
Marine Hotel will hold mail."

This is not entirely unexpected, tho I did not think he would go to
England so soon. However Hal wrote Babbitt very contentedly in Lon
don, and there is no earthly reason why he should not write the new novel
there. I have had two other radios from Hal, but no letter since reaching
the islands. There should be one any day.

Sincerely,
Grace Lewis

January 19
Dear Grace Lewis:

Don has shown me your letter quoting Hal s last cable. I am not
really surprised that he feels they will have exhausted the West Indies

[1923] 123

before very long, and it probably means that the book is taking more
and more definite shape in his mind and that he wants to get at the actual
writing of it.

I did have a good time in Florida and a complete let-down. I grew
so languid that three meals a day, ten hours sleep, one rubber of bridge,
and a half-mile walk made a full twenty-four hours. But after I had been
home a day or two New York air was like a cocktail, and I m going along
again. I do hope you are having a good time and a nice winter.

Sincerely yours,
Alfred Harcourt

January 24
Dear Sinclair:

I have your letter mailed from St. Thomas, and this morning a letter
from Grace says that she has received a fat letter from you. From all this,
I get a clear impression that you are immensely excited about The Bar
barian and that it is going splendidly. I am not surprised, but just the
same it is fine to know that you and De Kruif are so enthusiastic and
busy over it. Your wish that we were all sailing the tropic seas with you
comes at just the right time, for as I look out of the window, it is snow
ing hard and it is chilly and wet and generally unpleasant. Alf came back
from Florida last week and is feeling fine although I think he is a bit
put out at the idea of having to work so hard after a month in a warm
climate. He left Sue in Florida, but she came back a few days later. She
says she felt so good that she wanted to come home and show off. She
really seems made over.

Yesterday we had a reorder from McClurg for 1000 Babbitt. All the
signs indicate that it is holding over beautifully. The total of sales up
to December 3ist is 140,997.

You ll be glad to know that our problem of new quarters is solved.
I almost bought those two houses on East 49th Street, but the prospect
of building this year looked worse the more I looked into it, and Monday
we signed a lease for 20 years on a floor in a new building on Madison
Avenue at 47th Street. We have the whole fifth floor, and we plan to
sublet two or three pieces of it for briefer periods which will provide
for growth. We will probably be moving about the first of July.

The next time I see you will probably be in England, for I fully
expect to go over in the spring. We all send our love and good wishes.

Give De Kruif my warm regards.

Yours,
Don

12 4 ARROWSMITH

February i

Dear Red:

If I don t get a letter to you off now, you may not hear from me
before you get to England. I have been back a fortnight after a good
holiday. The spring business in general opens up well and Babbitt had
a good sale in January.

I think it is a good thing that you are going to London after the
circuit of the West Indies. I take it that means the book is getting itself
ready to write rather rapidly, and that after you have filled up on ma
terial you are going off to London to start writing it. You have all the
time in the world to do that with and all the loving care you want. I
think we will keep legs enough under Babbitt and get legs enough under
the earlier books so that it probably would not be wise to publish the
new book this year, even if you did get it ready in time to do so, though
I don t think there is much chance of that.

I think, too, that this job will give you a satisfaction of another and
better sort than the earlier books. I think you said once that your dis
tinguishing personal characteristic is a hatred of bunk. I think that is true,
though at the same time you understand it and don t hate the persons
but only their bunk performances. The hero of this new book is perhaps
the only hero you picked so far that feels as you do, and that ought to
warm up the book a good deal.

I hope you are well and happy, are you?

Ever yours,
Alf

At Sea, between Puerto Colombia
and the island of Curasao,
Tuesday, Feb. 13

Dear Alf, Don, Hal, Ellen, Gus, JES, and the rest:

Between going ashore at assorted places and working reasonably hard
on The Barbarian (that, or just Barbarian, without the article, seems to
stick by me as the title) and trying to write adequate letters to Gracie
and my father and meeting all sorts of variegated people on the ship and
ashore, I ve been kept too busy to be much of a correspondent.

The whole trip has gone splendidly. First as to the book: I m fairly
sure that it will be the best I have done more dramatic, bigger charac
ters. And this is not merely desire and pipe-dream, for the book takes
shape rapidly, despite all our sightseeing. There are hundreds of notes,
schedules, maps; and the actual skeleton from which I write the book is

[1923] 125

well under way. It will take me till I reach England-about three weeks
from now to finish that skeleton; it may even take a couple of weeks
longer; but then I can begin the actual writing of the ms. . . . This is
well in time-I didn t start the actual writing of Babbitt till the middle
of August, two years ago.

The trip has been jammed with sights and people amusing in them
selves and as material useful for this or later books officers on the two
steamers, wandering Americans and English and Germans and Dutch and
Spanish, all the curious races of the West Indies and Spanish America-
English settled there for ten generations, Negroes with curious dialects,
thousands of Hindus in Trinidad, Chinese there and in Panama, feeble
little Colombians, sturdy Indians, all kinds. Our intimates have been
curious contrasts on the Guicma, a roughneck English engineer; in Bar
bados, a prosy but capable old English doctor; in Panama, Major General
Sturgis and his wife; on the Crynssen, the cheerful first mate and a regu
lar stage Englishman who regards drafts (window ones, not bank drafts!)
with indignant astonishment. De Kruif and I today counted 1 55 separate
persons whom we ve met since January 4th and whom we seem to know
intimately!

It gives me joy to inform you that De Kruif is perfection. He has
not only an astonishing grasp of scientific detail; he has a philosophy
behind it, and the imagination of the fiction writer. He sees, synthesizes,
characters. YouVe sometimes said that my books are meaty; this will
be much the meatiest of all-characters, places, contrasting purposes and
views of life; and in all of this there s a question as to whether he won t
have contributed more than I shall have. Yet he takes it for granted that
he is not to sign the book with me. And he loves work he s most exu
berant when we re pounding on the book, and when we re not making
plans, when I m compiling notes into a coherent whol^ De Kruif is pre
paring more data clear, sound, and just the stuff for dramatic purposes.

On the boat from Curagao I met a young American named Richard
Whitcomb. He sells flour to merchants all thru this territory, but he s
one of the numerous big, energetic young Americans who are not suited
to this land of lazy men and low energy. He is more or less planning to
return north and, sizing him up, I conceived the idea that he might be
a good man for you perhaps put him in your retail bookshop 1 for
training, then send him out on the road. So I gave him a letter to you.

I hope you re advertising Babbitt. How is it going? I know nothing
as to how it s gone since Christinas. Please try to have a letter waiting
for me in England or coming to me as soon as possible after March 6,

Harcourt, Brace Bookshop was to open in March at 4 West 43rd Street,
New York.

126 ARROWSMITH

when I arrive; and let me know how much Babbitt has sold, how it s
going now, and all the personal news. Send me any especially interesting
new press comments on it tho IVe seen, in Panama, the mention of it in
the Mennen s Shaving Cream ad, and Hugh Walpole s summary of the
novels of 1922 juh see that in the Digest for Jan 13 or so?

I hope Alf has had a splendid trip to Florida, and that Sue is en
tirely well again, and that you-all are succeeding in finding the building
you want. My most affectionate regards to all of you.

Ever,
SL

Lots of luck! Look for a good time with BARBARIAN. Send a copy
of the new biography of S.L. to me if it s done. ... If any of you are
going to be in England, make it after I get there or cable um to wait
there for me, if possible.

On board the S.S. Crynssen
Just passed the Azores March ist
five days from Plymouth fine weather
except last night and today and these
only moderately rough.
Dear Alf and Don:

I was delighted to get letters from both of you when we stopped in
at Barbados. Glad to hear that you have been able to decide about the
new quarters, that Babbitt goes on selling; grateful that you have helped
Grace make investments for us; and most particularly and extremely glad
that Sue is well again and that there is a chance Don will be in England
this spring. He ll find me there, very much on the job, and I ll tell him
all about Barbarian plans. All I ll say now, in addition to previous re
marks, is that it continues unfalteringly to go on, that I like it ever better,
and that from Barbados here, with no ports to stop atand with the pas
sengers agreeable and very English and totally uninteresting and bridge-
playing, I ve done a very devil of a lot of what seems like first-rate work.
No, the book won t be done before some time next year in time for
publication in fall of 1924.

De Kruif will be with me in Londonthank God! His gift of dis
appearing for the whole long day (even on this little ship) when I want
to work alone, is as remarkable as his ability to be right here when I
need him. In London he ll be working on articles, but right on tap when
I need to confer with him about not merely scientific points but the
whole texture of the book for, even where I and not he have created a

[1923] 127

character, his understanding is perfect and always inspiring. You watch
(entirely aside from this book) that man. I have the same respect for
him that I had for a couple of brats named Alf Harcourt and Don Brace,
back in Gawd, it makes me feel old! 1915 or so.

Write me with speed-expect to be at 10 Bury St., but shan t know
till I land and accept my liveliest greetings. Let me know when Don
comes and whether he d like me to get him hotel accommodations if
there happens to be room at 10 Bury, it ll beat the Cecil all hollow. I ll
meet him and try in my gentle way to keep him from drinking licker.

Ever,
SL

March 9
Dear Red:

All this traveling and infrequent letters between us are quite in con
trast with the cheek-by-jowl work we did last May. We have just had
and passed around your good letter of February 13 written at sea. You
can imagine how eagerly we have all read it and how glad we are that
the trip, and the plan, and especially the De Kruif part of it are working
out so well. Aside from what I know it means to you personally to have
such companionship and collaboration, it means a great deal to the book
and to your work on it.

By the time this reaches you, you will probably have seen Cape and
know that the transfer of Main Street from Hodder- Williams to him is
arranged and of his plans for publishing the old books in England. We
have enjoyed Cape s visit here. He is a nice chap and gives that sense of
real integrity which makes business so comfortable.

The bookstore is just opening. Of course it is a little place, really a
shop. It may grow, but now there is not any room in it except" for the
two girls who run it, the books and, we hope, for customers.

Babbitt has sold about a thousand a week instead of the thousand or
1 500 a day that Main Street had in its second season. We have spent since
the first of January about $1500 in advertising, but the sales, as you see,
are not at an extraordinary rate. Don t be discouraged by this. So far as
I can see, it is the only big book of last fall, except Dorothy Canfield s
RougkhHe r um^ that has held over at all. We have sent out only just re
cently, so as not to conflict with the early flood of this year s books, the
three earlier novels together with the reprint of the Sherman article and
the biography.

* HB&Co., October 1922.

128 ARROWSMITH

Personally we are all in good trim. We plan to move in June to the
new office building opposite the Ritz. It is as good a location as we could
find; and we managed to get low rental and long term.

Don is rather aiming to get away to England just after the middle
of April Write as you have time. Of course we are eager for news of

you.

Ever yours,

Alf

March 22

Dear Sinclair:

We were delighted to get your letter from on board the steamer.
Now I think of you as happily located in London-at 10 Bury Street I
hope-all settled down and at work. It s fine that The Barbarian goes so
well. I feel that if you are satisfied with the way it s going it has passed
its most exacting critic.

I cabled you Saturday, and Monday morning we deposited $14,000
to your account. Just after cabling you I went over to the Chatham,
found Grace, had a delightful lunch with her at the Crillon, and put her
safely on board the 2: 20 for Hartford. Alf goes to Bermuda the day after
tomorrow with his family to be gone eight days.

I wish I could tell you on what date I shall sail, but I don t know,
I still expect to come this spring. Mr, and Mrs. M* F. Quinn * left here
in February for the Mediterranean trip and their schedule brings them
to London April 2jrd to zyth. Their address is care of The American
Express Company. If you feel inclined to look them up, I am sure they
will be delighted, and it might be fun for you too.

Everything goes on in about the usual way with us. We have all
been reading Edith Kelley s manuscript. In many respects it is a remark
ably fine job with rather too perfect a representation of the life of her
people to make it a novel. I suspect that we shall have to publish it, but
I am not sure of our decision yet.

I shall certainly not go to the Cecil again. Alf recommends the
Metropole. 10 Bury Street would be nice.

Affectionate good wishes to you and De Kruif,

Don

i Michael F. Quinn, founder of Quinn and Boden Company, printers for Har-
court, Brace.

[1923] 129

10 Bury St., St. James s,
London, March 24
Dear Alf :

Your letter of Feb 7 went to Barbados and following me here and
your letter of March 9 have both arrived, and now I feel that our lines
are straight again. I m all settled and on the job; De Kruif s wife has
arrived, and they ve taken a little flat in Chelsea for six months, so that
we can work together when necessary yet be altogether independent of
each other in between. I ve seen Cape and some of the changes he has
made in Mr. Wrennihey seem well-advisedfew phrases here and there
Anglicized,

I ve seen, of course, a lot of people since I arrived, but the only new
ones of importance have been Bertrand Russell as charming as he is wise,
Lloyd Osbourne, who seems to be a great Babbitt booster, Sir Philip
Gibbs another corker, and a bunch of physiologists and bacteriologists,
met thru De Kruif . I m in the old place on Bury Street, where Don might
stay when he comes if he d like to, he ought to let me know date ahead,
so I can engage a place. Sue will tell you how nice these little fiats are.
When Gracie comes over, we ll probably go to the country, after a bat
in London. ... I have a feeling we ll stay in Europe till, say, late fall
of 24 at most, a year after that, then return to US, to Washington or
N.Y.-NOT, b 7 God, to a Hartford!

All well.

Ever,
SL

April 4
Dear Red:

I am back from a week s trip to Bermuda coinciding with Hastings s
Easter vacation. We had a good time. Now I am settling down to hold
the fort as long as may be necessary, which probably is at least through
Don s trip to England which is getting pushed off toward late May and
through our moving and getting settled in the new quarters in the sum
mer.

It is good to find your note of March 14 with the Bury Street ad
dress. You have been happy and comfortable in that house and have
done much good work there. We have had to turn down Claude Wash-
burn s new novel. Hal and Don and I each read it and none of us could
see it. It was all too mild and, despite a few interesting characters, it
was just too much tea on the terrace and also luncheons, dinners, and

13 Q ARROWSMITH

breakfasts and the talk at them in and around Florence. We must not
clutter ourselves up with books that seem to us second-rate.

Spingarn is just back from the South looking better than I have seen
him in a long time and seeming to feel better.

Ever yours,
Atf

London, April 10

Dear Alf and Don:

All goes well, mit book and feelings. I ve seen a fair number of
people tho not too many. Weekend this past w.e. at H. G. Wells s
met the Countess of Warwick, and Ramsay Macdonald. The weekend
before Easter motored with Frazier Hunt, an American representing
the Hearst magazines here, and Boardman Robinson (now living here)
and his wife to Devon, stopping at Bath and Wells. Norman Hapgood *
has been here-he did not speak of serializing Barbarian; I guess that he
and Ray Long now realize that with the price I would want and the
non-breaking-for-serial type of books I write, they re lucky not to get
it, and if that is so it will save future fussing.

By the way: about the title. Is just Barbarian, sans article, too much
like Babbitt? I don t think so. And there has, dammit, been a book called
The Barb published recently, which might interfere with using The Bar
barian. One or the other seems to me we d better use they fit the book.
Which do you prefer?

I still think Don would like it here at 10 Bury St very much. Staying
here just now is George Kaufman of Kaufman and Connelly, authors of
Dulcy, the dramatization of Merton of the Movies, etc. Lunch this noon
with Ferris Greenslet 2 and John Buchan. They seem to be ardent ad
mirers of Babbitt. Dinner with Cape this evening.

I hope your moving will go well I hope you ve taken Edith Kelley s
novel I hope you are keeping sober.

Ever,
SL

April 23
Dear Red:

At last we are getting a little action on the earlier novels. I enclose
the pieces from yesterday s Times and Saturday s Post.

1 Norman Hapgood at this time was with Hearst s International Magazine.

2 A director of Houghton MifHin Company.

[1923] 13 i

Had luncheon with Grace Friday. I d say she is five years younger
than last May and quite apt to run away with you when she gets to
England.

About the title, it is tangled. Barbarian has an adjectival sense that
Babbitt hasn t. I suppose the American high schools have made phrases
like "barbarian invasion" jump into mind at the use of the word. It raises
the question, "Barbarian what?" The Barbarian is rather too much like
The Virginian. Can t you rather hear Ward Macauley x ask, "Is Lewis
trying a Tarzan novel?" Aren t both satirical titles? Is not that aspect of
your work apt to be over-emphasized by critics anyway? Better let the
title simmer a while longer, though I know it does mean a lot to you to
write to a title. I don t say at all that I don t like either of them. But let s
cogitate about this carefully.

Thank you for your cable suggesting that you do the cutting on
the Edith Kelley novel. 2 We had just sent the manuscript back with our
suggestions of cuts. Hal Smith did a careful and excellent job on it. We
sent her a few hundred dollars to give her leisure to pull it together.
There s great stuff in it. I think it will come out as a good book. If it
doesn t, it will be a long time before we fuss with another job of editing,
if the editing looks like a serious undertaking.

Ever yours,
Alf

London, April 25
Dear Alf and Don:

There really isn t a devil of a lot of news except that Barbarian
marches on, I m well, I ve seen a lot of people, and I m awaiting Gracie s
comingshe sails in ten days now.

The new peopleLord Beaverbrook, weekend at Lady Astor s (in
cidentally she is an extremely interesting person, and Lord Astor is really
a charming fellow, somewhat overclouded by her fame) where I met
Philip Kerr who was L George s secretary during the war he s just been
in America. Met a number of scientists and been in several laboratories
watching actual work, which will make much more real the stuff in
Barbarian. Lunch with Sir Walter Fletcher, head of the Medical Re
search Fund of the Brit govt. A day with Philip Gibbs in the country.
AND so on. I ve seen Cape several times, and like him better and better.
By the way, he s interested in the new book on sea-power and blockade
of my friend Prof. Maurice Parmelee, of whom I ve written you now

1 Prominent Detroit bookseller.

2 Weeds, HB&Co., 1923.

132 ARROWSMITH

and then; if it comes to you, sent by Curtis Brown s x man, give it unusual
attentionmight be one of the books which, sole authorities, go on selling
for twenty years.

I cabled you, after receiving a letter from Edith Kelley, that if you
liked I d be glad to look over her book in re cuts. I do hope this pans
out well I judge she has a real future and present! Don t plan to cut
too much remember that well-known vollum Main Street which, from
certain points of view, might have stood a hell of a lot more cutting,
yet which did go, as I remember the figures, extremely well for the work
of a young author.

Quinn is here, and Cape and Howard 2 and I have given him a lunch
and shown him a printing establishment & I ll see them again.

Will you, on receipt of this, please deposit another thousand dollars
to my credit? I might be able to get thru till Gracie arrived mit money,
but better not take a chance on running short. . . .

My very best, and looking forward eagerly to Don s coming. Only
I wish the whole damn firm were coming!

Ever,
SL

London, May 3
Dear Alf :

Gracie will arrive here the 14th, and from about the iyth to, say,
the 25th we ll probably be down in the country, so if by any chance it
happened that Don arrived here at that time I wouldn t be here to greet
him. But from about the 25th to mid-June or July ist we ll be right here
at Georgian House and the whole family can have some good times to
gether.

The plan all finished, with magnificent scientific stuff from De Kruif
as background not necessarily all to be used but as reference when
needed the book itself is booming ahead and seems to go very well in
deed. . . , I think BARBARIAN, sans the article, is the title, but as you say,
we must mull over it we have almost a year before the title must be
finally fixed, so that you can announce it. Here s the list of other titles
that seem possible: BARBARIAN COURAGE HORIZON WHITE TILE CIVIL
IZED THE MERRY DEATH THE SAVAGE MARTIN ARROWSMITH TEST
TUBE.

Love and kisses,

SL
Any real sale on Wrenn-~Hcwk--]ob?

1 London literary agent.

2 G. Wren Howard, associate of Jonathan Cape-

[ 1923 ] 133

May yth
Dear Lewis:

I had a little visit with Grace over the telephone Saturday morning
just before she went to the steamer. She was delighted to be sailing. Later
in the morning your letter came.

It was nice of you to make something of the Quinns while they were
in London. He s a fine old boy and on several occasions has stood his
plant on its head for our mutual benefit.

Another occasion of the same sort may present itself to you within
the next month or so. Miss Grace Thompson of L. S. Ayers, Book De
partment, Indianapolis, is on your side of the water and will be in London
about the end of May. I gave her a card to you and if it comes handy
she is worth some attention. She s an awfully nice girl of the Marcella
Burns * type but younger, and is doing the same sort of thing for In
dianapolis and thereabouts as Marcella has done for Chicago. This is her
first trip abroad. She used to be salesgirl under Melcher when he was in
Indianapolis and for the last three or four years has been building a first-
rate department in the town s best store. She has used a good many more
than her quota of your books and is a warm friend of ours.

Things are going well with us. Papini s Life of Christ 2 is the best-
selling non-fiction book in the country; in fact, Baker & Taylor say it
sold more last month than all but one novel.

Sincerely,
Alf

May ii
Dear Sinclair:

As you will have suspected, I am having a lot of difficulty in getting
away to London. Now the date has been postponed until about the first
of June. I am inclined to think I will come then unless I decide in the
next few days that it is too indecent to be away during moving and in
the midst of getting the fall list ready. That is as definite as I can be about
it this morning. I suppose when I do get to London you will be in the
country or somewhere, but if you are not farther away than Egypt I will
see you anyhow. This will find you a reunited family; I hope Grace has
had a good voyage and that she finds herself even happier than she ex
pected to be on reaching London.

Ever yours,
Don

1 Marcella Burns Hahner, head of the book department of Marshall Field and
Company, Chicago.

* Life of Christ by Giovanni Papini, HB&Co., March 1923.

134 ARROWSMITH

London, May 26

Dear Alf and Don:

Is there any more sale on Babbitt? and are Wrenn etc. starting to
sell? Cape is making a fine splurge here with Wrenn, with subway posters
and plenty of ads in the papers.

Don s last notification is that he may be sailing by June ist. I think
we shall be right here at 10 Bury St. till July ist, then somewhere in the
country in England, and we shall be awfully eager to see him. I wish
you were both coming. ... I shall watch for Louis Untermeyer and
Grace Thompson.

Gracie seems to like the plot of Barbarian enormously, and the be
ginning of the actual ms so far as she has read it. She thinks it will have
a chance to be much the biggest book I have ever done. . . . Alf s last
letter suggests that Martin Arrowsmith seems to him just now the best
title. Well, it s certainly a possible one. You might add this to the list I
gave: STRANGE ISLANDS. BUT no doubt it sounds too much like a South
Sea island romance. It s probably a choice between Martin Arrowsmith
and Barbarian without the article.

Gracie and I have just come back from a bully week s walking tour
in lovely Devon, and are off today for a weekend at H. G. Wells s, and
next Monday I shall get back on the job, to some extent tho probably
I shan t be completely back on it till we get off to the country. But I m
well ahead of my time-table if Babbitt may be taken as a standard.

All goes well. Wells Lewis is sent off to a jolly boys school till we
get off to the country; Gracie is enjoying London; and me I feel wigorous.

Ever,
rf

June 5
Dear Red:

Don will have given you what news there is. Carl Sandburg came
in yesterday afternoon and said that he d seen the picture of Main Street
in Chicago. 1 I m happy to report that he liked it. He said a curious thing
seemed to have happenedthat while the scenario did violence to the
story and to the ideas you wanted to put over in it, the actors had taken
the thing back into their own hands, so that the spirit after all was near
enough that of the book. The only thing he really objected to was their
making a caricature of Miles Bjornstam and a comic out of the maid Bea.
He thinks it may go big.

Yours,
Alf

i Carl Sandburg was writing motion picture reviews for the Chicago Daily News,

[1923] 135

Le Val-Changis,

Avon, Seine-et-Marne, France

July 7
Dear Alf :

I ve scarcely even sent you a note, the past six weeks, both because
IVe been with Don, and I knew he would give you the news, and be
cause Grace and I have been busy, first making up by a lot of London
parties for her dull winter in Hartford and second house-hunting in
France. By the same token I haven t done a lick of work. But now here
we are most agreeably settled in a charming house with a shady garden
on the edge of Fontainebleau; I m settled down again for from three to
five months, and damn glad to be. We got in day before yesterday and
already Fm started at work.

It was pleasant to play about London all sorts of people from Lord
Beaverbrook to Stacy Aumonier, H. G. Wells to Donald Ogden Stewart,
but that sort of thing entails staying up too late, rushing too much, and
too many cocktails, and much tho I like all those decorations, I ve been
overjoyed here, with a simple supper, cooked as only a French cook can
do it, on the terrace, looking down the lawn to thick woods, then getting
to bed early.

Don will probably reach NY before this letter. Tell him I was
awfully sorry not to see him again his note came this morning. I hope
the rest of you will agree with Don that Paul de K s story of microbes x
will make a good book. Personally I m enthusiastic, and if you d like I ll
back the financial obligation of the advance.

Let me know how Babbitt and Wrerm-Hawk-Job are going. What s
being done about serial on Babbitt? What s the office news? Meantime
you may picture me here, in a quiet room off a garden, working like hell
on Martin A.

Our best,
SL

July 1 9th
Dear Red:

It s good to have your letter of July 7th. There has been no par
ticular reason why we should correspond as regularly this year as we
have in past years, and I have pumped Don for all the news of you folks
and the book which he could give. Nevertheless it is good to have a
direct letter.

Don had a good time in London; really, I think one of the best

1 Microbe Hunters, published by Harcourt, Brace in 1926.

1 36 ARROWSMITH

times he has ever had. Good for him and good for the business, too.
Spingarn is a good deal better and beginning to take hold again. Hal
settled down to be a real comfort and shows signs of being a bit of a
genius as an editor. The new quarters are fine much better light and
space and arrangements for everyone except, perhaps, me. I grew to be
extremely fond of that front room at i W. 4yth Street. Business is good
our sales for the first 6 months were $100,000 ahead of the same period
last year, thanks considerably, though not entirely, to the success of
Papini s Life of Christ. It looks as if that will hold over to a big autumn
sale. I am sending you a fall list and you ll see that it is a nice lot of books.

The second serial rights of Babbitt are released the first of August
through the International Feature Service.

I like the outline of De Kruif 7 s Story of Microbes and I am glad to
report that Don grew to like De Kruif very much personally after what
he saw of him in London, I do not think that you should guarantee the
advance to De Kruif on this book. It is generous for you to think of it.

Sales of B&bbitt last spring were just under 10,000 copies, The earlier
novels have not seemed to find any new life here. In fact, it would be
my guess that we have spent at least a dollar in advertising for each copy
we ve sold. The Harper editions kicked around the bookstores just enough
to foul the market and to make the trade unwilling to stock them.

Don liked what he saw of the new novel and he was also much im
pressed by the idea for one which grew out of the talk after Tinker *
spent an evening with you,

Ever yours,
Alf

July 31
Dear Sinclair:

After you left I finished up my last week in London in a mad rush
with hardly any sleep, but I had a fine voyage home, and I have now had
a little over two weeks at the office interrupted only by a trip up to
Vermont near the Canadian border to see the children. It took a good deal
of adjusting to get used to the new quarters after having sailed away from
47th Street. There must have been a kind of youth and informality about
the other place; here the concern looks as though it might have been
going on forever, The offices are fine with plenty of light, air, and con
venience, and everybody is happy and busy. Hartman 2 came down last

1 Chauncey B. Tinker, professor of English literature at Yale.

2 The artist C, Bertram Hartman whom Harcourt, Brace commissioned to do the
batik mentioned.

[1923] 137

week with a batik for the reception room which is both lovely and amus
ing. JES seems much improved in health, and more happy and vigorous
than I have seen him in a long time. Hal is taking a vacation this week.
Sue is again not at all well and Alf is feeling a good deal of anxiety.
Except for that, everything is flourishing.

I had a splendid time in London; it gets better the more I think
about it. The fact that you and Grace were there is largely responsible
for it. I hope you like the house and that by this time you are com
fortable, happy, and busy. I wish I could have come over to see you,
but I have a queer kind of conscience which makes me suspect my rea
sons for wanting to do things when they are too attractive. The talks
we had about the new novel were rather scrappy, but I arn very keen
about the whole thing. It seems to me that your characters and situations
are going to bite a little deeper even than they did in Babbitt, and it is
sure to be a great book. I ll bet you re enjoying getting at it again.

Much love to you both,

Don

Avon, France
July 3 1
Dear Alf:

It was good to have your long letter. Keep the news coming I m
out of touch with everybody here* We ve been here a month, lacking
three days, and it s been superb quiet, beautiful, working like hell all
day and practically every day going off on an exploration tour to the
lil villages about, every eight or ten days and the book has gone tre
mendously.

I have two or three more titles to consider besides MARTIN ARROW-
SMITH which is certainly very possible, and has, so far as I can see, only
one objection its resemblance to Martin Chuzzlewit and Martin Eden.
These new ones are: The Stumbler Martin Arr&wsmith, M.D.Dr.
ArrowsmthThe Shadow of Max Gottlieb The Destroyer. I like the
first of these quite a lot it s short, I think unusual, and fits the idea of the
book, as you will see when you read it.

One thing I wish you d have done before I forget it. Have Hal or
somebody look up in the American Who s Who, the English ditto, the
American Medical Register or whatever they call it, & the British Medical
Register & Amer. Blue Book, to see if there are any, or how many, people
having the following names: Martin Arrowsmith, Max Gottlieb, Gustaf
Sondelius, Leora Tozer, Terry Wickett, T.J.H.Silva, Bruno Zechlin,
Angus Duer, Clifford Clawson, Almus Pickergill, Rippleton Holabird,

138 ARROWSMITH

(Mrs.) Joyce Lanyon. They are the chief characters among some mil
lions of minor characters. We wouldn t necessarily change the names if
there were identities with real people want to know who those people
were, first. It sounds like a hell of a job, particularly if whoever does it
has to report on several identities, but I m remembering the lot of trouble
we might easily have had a year ago with Geo F Babbitt of Boston. For
tunately out of all of these, most of them are on the good sidemore or
less a compliment to resemble em except for Duer, Pickergill, and Hola-
bird, who are goats.

Thanks for the deposit of the three thousand. It s not too cheap to
live here, food surprisingly high, but still it is cheaper than London by
a good deal, especially as we rarely go to restaurants.

Let me know how the Babbitt serial rights go.

Besides the Tinker novel of which Don spoke, I have eleven others
which I could write, so I probably shan t dry up for some time yet a
few days ago I listed em, just to see how many of them were keeping
fresh in my mind. Neighbor l is still in the list, but rather far down in it.

Now on the job, then a little tennis, a little bicycling, a little more
job, dinner outdoors with long French loaf and Camembert and bottle
of excellent vin ordinaire at one franc 95 about twelve cents a little
reading, and to bed early!

Ever,
SL
What s become of the Bill Benet Elinor Wylie romance?

The death of Mrs. Harcourt in August interrupted the correspondence
-for more than a month.

September 18
Dear Red:

There isn t much news, but I do want to tell you that Grosset and
Dunlap have just printed another 0,000 Main Street which makes 135,000
in their edition this year. * "~ " ""

Hastings and I are back at Mount Vernon, and I wish you d come
and live with us whenever you feel like it. Everybody s well here, and
business is good. I think Ellen has sent you a copy of Edith Kelley s
Weeds. It is a rather powerful and promising job.

Ever yours,
Alf

1 Lewis was contemplating a book on the American labor movement for which
he had invented the title Neighbor. It was to be founded on the life of Eugene Debs,
Socialist and labor leader. Lewis struggled with this conception for a novel for many
years, but was unable to bring it to fruition.

[1923] 139

Avon, France
September 21
Dear Alf :

I m delighted that you re back at work and that you had the wise
long tour with Hastings. We leave here two weeks from now for a
month s rambling in Italy (a rest I can do with, after three months of
the most complete concentrated kind of work) , then up to London, prob
ably, to be settled and much at work for all winter with a house, but
with me off out of sight in a little office somewhere all day. We plan
to see Venice, Verona, Lake Como, a few other places, and to take it
very easy. Wells will be left with people near either Paris or London.

AND before I leave here I hope to have the entire first draft of Martin
done! certainly practically done. It will be about the same length as the
first draft of Main Street and, like it, will be considerably cut. Seems to
me it s been getting better and better last part much better than the part
Don saw. Paul de Kruif comes over from London next week to spend
a week here going over it minutely then later we must also have him
read the proofs.

I expect the rewriting or rewritings to take me about five months
so, with a month off for Italy, it ought to be done and in your hands
by the first of May of next year. I ll come over with it. AND it may be
before May ist. I returned with Babbitt (but with a week of work still
to do on it) on May zoth, last year. I m for publication NOT TOO EARLY
in the fall so many publishers, this year, seem to have hit on the same
trick of getting out their fall leaders early, even in August, and I ll bet
a Scott hat they ll do so even more next year.

Does Martin Arrowswrith still seem the title? What about THE
STUMBLER ARROWSMITH DR. ARROWSMITH. A complete list of possible
titles as I now have them: MARTIN ARROWSMITH THE STUMBLER THE
BARBARIAN BARBARIAN ARROWSMITH DR. ARROWSMITH MARTIN M.D.
CIVILIZED TEST-TUBE THE SAVAGE THE SHADOW OF MAX GOTTLIEB.
Go over it, with Gus, Hal, Don, Ellen.

Grace went to London to have her tonsils out. She s been back here
a week now and feels fine as we all do. I m tired, but it s been so lovely
and quiet in this secluded place that I m not too tired, though I ve been
spending most all my time facing this damn HI Corona.

Let me hear.

Love,
Red

Has Spingarn looked into the matter of Marcel Proust? One or two vol
umes of him in translation have been published in England have any in
America? He seems to be all the rage here. Edith Wharton, whom I ve
seen several times, is extremely enthusiastic about him.

140 ARROWSMITH

P,S, II-67-B : Grade and Paul still seem to like just Martin Arrow-
rmth best among all the titles. . . . Does the resemblance to Martin
Cbuzzlewit and Martin Eden bother you? ... I think I ve asked you
this sixteen or twenty times but if I have, then, drat your soul, you ve
never answered it.

Avon, France
September 28
Dear Alf :

A joy to have your letter of ten days ago. This will presumably be
the last letter I ll write you from here we re off for Italy in six days.
I shall have the first draft of Martin done before I go only about two
more days work, Paul has been down here and read all but that two
days of it. He seems somewhat more than enthusiastic. He thinks, first,
that the scientific stuff is absolutely accurate and absolutely dramatized
fictionized-and second that it is much the best book I ve ever done. But
of course with his nearness to the book he is the worst as well as the best
possible critic. Certainly he seems to feel that I have carried out all the
high things we dreamed while we were planning it (& damn high they
was!).

I ve read Edith Kelley s Weeds. It is big, powerful, real stuff, with
a professional touch in the style, a calmness, a sureness, which I had not
expected from a first novel I think you have something big in her & in
this book.

In writing to her I warned her of one danger: Because she has, in
various apparently different but inherently alike phases, led much the
same life as her own heroine Judy finding whether as Upton Sinclair s
secretary, as wife of Allan Updegraff and teacher in NY East Side High
Schools, as keeper of a farm-highbrow-boarding house in New Jersey,
as Kentucky farmer or California farmer in all of them the same mill of
discouragement, the same one-damn-thing-after-another therefore there
might well be that greatest danger of the author with one promising first
book the danger of simply doing again the same book with only apparent
changes, the change of futile Kentucky lanes to inherently identical futile
Harlem streets.

I think we have something here, arriving just at the time when the
US, weaned from pink romance, is ready for her. Don t let her fail for
lack of encouragement particularly in the hard dollars which will make
it possible for her to work.

I know I KNOW, damn you I ve also sent Claude Washburn, Bech-
hofer, the Nonpartisan League historian, and Allan Updegraff to you,
and they ve all been washouts. But still have I ever more than sent them
to you for your own final decision-have I ever done much whooping

[1923] 141

for them when they have sent in bad work? The two whom I trust after
seeing not their probabilities but their actual accomplishments are Edith
Summers Kelley and Paul de Kruif .

BY the way: Edith ought to sign herself just Edith Summers. It
would be no rudeness to her husband Gracie when she occasionally
writes signs herself Grace Hegger.

And BY the way: I see that Houghton Mifflin have just published a
book called Civilization and the Microbe, by one Kendall, prof of bac
teriology in Northwestern University. This may or may not at all in
terfere with the plans of Paul. I ve told him to get a copy of the book
the moment he gets home (he sails for US on October 25) and make
surepossibly modify his own plans if necessary. But he has been getting
so much fresh material, hitherto unpublished, about Pasteur, Leeuwen-
hoek, and other European romantic heroes of bacteriology, and his mind
works so differently from anybody else s that I don t believe they will
be much alike, and it s good that his book will come a year and a half
after this other. But let s take precautions to keep the courses different,
now while it s early; so talk over Kendall s book with Paul, ... If you
could have seen how he went at Martin here working night and day yet
reading with such minute precision! My admiration for him is greater
now than ever.

So! That s all, I think, before I start. . . . Don t you want to come
over to London some time this winter?

Ever,
Red

Avon, France
Sunday, September 30
Dear Alf :

I finished the first draft of Martin today. It comes out 748 pages plus
a certain number of insert pages about 245,000 words long. How much
it will cut I don t know- there s so much more story to it than there was
to Main Street with all the strung-together incidents in M.St. that it may
not cut so much as that first draft did. . . . But cheer up. Remember that
most of the books that keep going, like Old Wives Tale,, are indecently
long.

Again, like Patti, 1 we bid farewell.

Ever,
Red

1 Reference to the continued "farewell" appearances of Adelina Patti, famous
soprano.

142 ARROWSMITH

I have read the new novels by Edith Wharton and Charles Norris, and
Weeds is so much better than either of em that there s no comparison.
The same is probly true of Van Vechten s Bow-Boy, except that the two
are so different that it s unfair to compare em. As for Bill Woodward s
Bunk, it s no good whatever, and as they want me to write about it, I
shall (confidentially) fail to receive either the book or Harper s letter.

October i
Dear Red:

I am delighted to have yours of September 2ist I hope you and
Grace have a wonderful month in Italy. You can imagine how much in
terest all the news has for us. As to time for publication of the new book,
we want to have it ready early enough to be able to publish it either late
or early according to the situation we find next summer. It s true that
everybody has been early this year. They will probably be late next year.
Then the thing to do is to outguess the crowd, or better, size up book
trade conditions. It was wise to publish the bulk of our list early this
year. Booksellers had a good spring and were in the buying mood during
the summer, but the last month has been rather flat with them and they
have shut up pretty tight on orders for late books.

There seems to be no hesitation around here that Martin Arrowsmth
is the best title. I am having a little leaning toward Dr, Arro<wswlith\
though I doubt if that s better in the long run. For the short view, it
saves saying a thousand or more times that the hero is a doctor. The
world pretty much knows now that your father was a small-town doctor,
and it would readily connote to a good many thousands of people a more
than glowing story with a hero of whom you approve as one of the bases
of civilization.

We ve been over the Marcel Proust matter several times-too early,
in fact, because when we first went after it, the Frenchman wanted a
thoroughly impossible sum and we had to let go. Later, Chatto and
Windus got out the translation in England and sold some sheets to Holt
of one or two volumes, which rather spoils the market for us.

Business is good. It looks as though we should have the biggest year
so far.

Ever yours,
Alf

[1923] 143

October 10
Dear Red:

Yesterday afternoon Sewell Haggard telephoned that the Butterick
people were extremely anxious for a feature serial for the Designer in
order to put that magazine on the map next year. He said that he heard
your novel was approaching completion and he wanted it. I said, "Do
you want $50,000 worth?" He gasped a little at that and said he d call
me back. He did call later and said we could consider that we had an
offer from them of $50,000 for the first serial rights. I told him that the
book would turn out to be as long as Main Street and he said, "Well,
that would mean we would run big chunks of it in each issue and get it
out of the way so that you could publish in the spring of 1925."

So this morning I cabled you. I do not feel that I ought to decide
this matter without having your views. I will say that if I did decide it
now, I would accept. Of course we made a lot of plans on having your
new book next year and hired another salesman to start in the spring,
but we can use him anyway and we have a strong list generally. I know
you and Grace are on a holiday in Italy and there may be some delay
in the cablegram reaching you. If I am forced to a decision before I can
hear from you, I will accept this offer.

Ever yours,
Alf

October 27
Dear Red:

Two weeks have gone by without a reply to my cable in regard to
the sale of the first serial rights of Martin Arrowsmith. I understand that
this has been due to your holiday and that you have probably not re
ceived my cable. Meantime, the Designer people, primarily Sewell Hag
gard, are pressing me for a decision. I am having lunch with them Mon
day, and if dates, terms and everything are all favorable to you and the
fortunes of the book as far as I can judge, I shall accept their offer. I
hate to do this without having your views, but in the first place it seems
to me the wise thing to do for your interest, and in the second place it
may relieve you of some embarrassment with your other friends in the
magazine world. To have had the matter taken out of your hands and
settled without your knowledge enables you to make me the goat.

The effect on our business in not publishing Martin Arrowsmith next
year will be significant but not serious. If we did publish it next year,
we were all set to pass a million dollars business, but without this $200,-
ooo and more of sales, I still think that next year will show an increase

144 ARROWSMITH

over any previous year. It all comes down to the fact that I cannot see
any compelling reason why you should not have this $50,000 from seriali
zation in a magazine that will not get in the way of book sales in any
significant fashion.

Ever yours,
Alf

October 30
Dear Red:

The Designer people would not wait beyond yesterday for a de
cision, and for all the reasons which will readily occur to you, I have
accepted their proposal. I hope by all that s holy that you approve. Un
less you re entirely satisfied to have me settle things like this for you,
don t again go out of the reach of cablegrams for so long. At any rate,
this is the highest bona fide price for magazine serialization that I ve ever
heard of.

Yours,
Alf

Hotel Curzon
London

November sixth

(Address 58 Elm Park Gardens, S.W.io)
Dear Alf:

I m cabling you today Deposit two thousand Guaranty/ As I
omitted the PLEASE in a frugal and mean way, I herewith add it, also
thanks. ...

The address above is a rather charming furnished house we ve taken
for the winter-just on the borders of Kensington and Chelsea-taken it
till next June though probably I myself will be coming home considerably
before that, leaving Grade and the kid there while I thresh round with
you and Paul, and run out to Minnesota and so on. I ll be back on the
job in couple days now. . . . Most agreeable time Italy- Venice, Vicenza,
Padova, Verona, Milan, Mennagio (on Lake Como), Siena, and Florence,
Got a beautiful rest and feel like work.

Now about the serial I hate serialization but it seems foolish to lose
fifty thousand. I promised Ray Long of the Hearst organization also Karl
Harriman of Red Book a chance to bid against any others, and would
they hurt book sale any more than Designer with the huge circulation

[1923] 145

drive they will be making? Give Ray and Karl the chance to bidif it
is still possible. In London, Don and I assured Frazier Hunt, the foreign
representative of the Hearst magazines, that we would absolutely not
serialize, so gave him no chance to talk business and Frazier is an intimate
friend of mine. It seems impossible to decide what is best to do in a case
like this and I appreciate the worry you must have had.

I m thoroughly grateful to you for your thought and work on this,
and I understand how much against your interests, as publisher, it was.
One thing I wish to emphasize. I suppose Haggard will have to cut, but
I will not change the thing into a sunny sweet tale nor will I permit him
to. DOES HE UNDERSTAND THAT? Please let me know, for otherwise he
can t have it at any price. (Not that there s much really offensive in novel,
anyway. He needn t worry.)

Isn t there some chance that you will come over here this winter?
Your room will be ready for you at the house, and we could have some
marvelous times together.

Ever,
SL

November 8
Dear Red:

I received your cablegram about the serialization. I have cleared the
record for you with Ray Long and his crowd. I will write an explanation
to Karl Harriman the first chance I get. It begins to look as if it were
fortunate that this matter developed as it did. After I had named a price
to Sewell Haggard and he had accepted, I could hardly have used that
price to start an auction, and the way it all happened lets you out. At
any rate, we have made a good sale at a high price in a place apt to affect
book sales little, if any, and with the dates so arranged as to release book
publication at a useful time.

One of the pleasant episodes of a crowded week has been a visit
from Paul de Kruif. He came in Monday, was much interested in the
serialization news and approved of it heartily so far as his interest was
concerned. He and his nice little wife were out to Don s to dinner last
night. They are having lunch with me tomorrow. I have enjoyed seeing

them.

Yours,
Alf

146 ARROWSMITH

58 Elm Park Gardens
Chelsea, London, S.Wao
November 12
Dear Alf :

I wonder if in my letter about the serial rights of Martin Arrowsmith
(yes, I think that title is probably better than Dr. Arrowswtith) I ex
pressed my really very great appreciation of your efforts for me and your
possible sacrifice. I do feel it! Have you seen Paul de Kruif? What does
he think of the matter of serialization? Does he understand that the book
is not to be injured for serialization? As I asked before, does Haggard
understand there will be no sunny conventionalities tucked in?

I met Frederick O Brien ( White Shadows in South Seas) . Writing a
novel. Awfully good fellow. Is sore at Century Company. He s just sailed
for NY. Told him I d write you.

Though we don t move into our house till day after tomorrow, I m
already settled and at work I have a room for writing, of all delightful
places, in the Temple! . . . Are you coming over this winter? Come on!

Ever,
SL

November 21
Dear Red:

Of course we ve seen De Kruif. He is delighted with the serial sale.
Twenty-five thousand words of the manuscript are to be delivered in
February. I haven t done anything about Karl Harriman, and I m a little
embarrassed about doing so. I never have met him, he has never asked me
about the serial rights, and it would be a little gratuitous, it seems to me,
for me to explain to him that I ve sold them. You better write him direct.

I will talk with Hal and Don about Frederick O Brien. He s probably
worth our getting after, but we have about all the fiction we need for
next year unless it is something or somebody whom it would be absolutely
foolish to ignore. We could take O Brien for the fall, but I am more and
more convinced that we are right in holding our list to about one hundred
books a year and doing our darndest with those we do take. The way
authors are flocking around us, it takes a lot of independence to stick to
this. It also means that we ll make some mistakes, but we mustn t worry
about those. We have already counted over twenty novels that we ve
turned down on other publishers fall lists, None of the twenty have made
fools of us yet, but every once in a while we ll turn down something that
will make a big success. Hal Smith said the other day that it is getting
harder for us to take a book of creative literature than for the camel to

[1923] 147

go through the eye of the needle. Well, that s true and I guess it s right.
It is right if we are going to continue to give special attention to each
book we take and not let them merely go through the mill.

It would be lovely to go over this winter. Hastings and I are happy
and comfortable at home. We are having probably the last few years of
a rich and satisfying personal association. He is getting along well in
school and I doubt if I ll go away for long until next summer. Also we re
busy here. I m devoting a good deal of time to the textbook department.

Yours,
Alf

London, December 3
Dear Alf:

Is the title understood then as Dr. Arrowsmth? Is that final? The
thing against it is that Arrowsmith is much more Martin than Dr. ifs his
personal and scientific career that counts much more than his medical
droer Paul de Kruif can explain this to you. Will you please, P.D.Q.,
talk this over with Paul, then with Sewell. But Dr. is shorter, and quite all
right. Please do give this thought before it s too late.

Have you sold any Weeds at all? You haven t told me a thing about
how it s gone. Have you hopes for her next? My belief in her is very
great.

I can see how you feel about not coming over here this winter. My
own plans seem to be somewhat as follows just now: I hope to have
Arrowsmith finished by the end of April or earlier, and to come over to
the States with an expectation to stay for a long time. As soon as I ve gone
out West to see my father, and generally floated around a little, I ll settle
down to the next book. This one may be much shorter and more adven
turous, and you could probably publish it in the spring of 1926, a year
after Arrowsmith, with the next, again a long one, coining a year and a
half after that. I ll talk it over with you when I come home.

The revising of Arrowsmith goes famously. I m raising hell with the
first part, which starts rather too slowly. We re all well, though this
blasted London fog does give us colds now and then. Does Babbitt keep
on selling at all?

Frazier Hunt, now sailed for America, may come in to talk over his
contemplated novel with you. He s a fine fellow and, if he settles down
to it, may produce a good book.

Ever,
Red

148 ARROWSMITH

December 12
Dear Red:

I do not understand that the title, Dr. Arrovosmith, is final. Haggard
likes it, Paul likes it, and I like it, but neither Haggard nor I know any
thing about the book in detail, and Paul is inexperienced in this realm and
inclined merely to acquiesce in what he considers our experienced judg
ment. The argument for "Dr," is about as follows:

It saves prefacing every statement in advertising and by salesmen
with the explanation that the book is about a doctor. The first question
anyone asks is "What is Lewis s new book about?" To have the title
answer that is useful, distinctly so. You have become such a figure and
information about you is so widespread that literally thousands of people
know your father was a small-town doctor. Hundreds of thousands, per
haps a million or so, think that the most likeable character you have
created so far is DocKennicott, so that besides defining the sort of person
the hero of the new book may be, the word "Dr." in the title creates a
hazy but nevertheless valuable predisposition in its favor to the effect that
the hero is a character with whom you are in sympathy. Of course these
arguments don t amount to much if they do violence to the book. If,
when people have finished the novel, they feel that the "Dr." part of the
title is wrong, then the title is wrong. As to this, under the present cir
cumstances, you are the only one who can decide. If I had read the book
or a good part of it, I d think my judgment was worth something. Since
you put this down as a possible title, I just assumed that it did not do
violence to the book itself.

The best thing in your letters in months is the statement that you
expect to come over here to stay for a long time, Bully!

We have not been able to get more than a thousand or fifteen hun
dred people to read Weeds, Critics who really dip into it like it and praise
it highly but it just will not penetrate.

Babbitt has slowed up pretty much. I think I wrote of the contract
for 200,000 cheap ed. next fall.

I haven t seen Frazier Hunt. Paul saw him last week.

Yours,
Alf

London, December 27
Dear Alf:

A quiet, very happy Xmas, with dinner with Curtis Brown. . . .
Recent acquisition, Arnold BennettI like him. . . . Work going splen
didlyI ll send Haggard about 43,000 words about January 10-

[1923] 149

Title

I think your arguments for Dr. Arrowsmith as title are sound, and it
does not do any violence to the book. The only thing then is: shall it be
DR. ARROWSMITH or DR. MARTIN ARROWSMITH. The advantage of the
latter is its impressing the full name of the hero on readers, that he may
the better live. I ll write Haggard this same thing, and he and you can
decide between you, by phone.

Book manuscript

If I were you (and in this case the you refers to everybody connected
with Harcourt-Brace) I don t believe I d even read the installments that
go over to Haggard BECAUSE I am more or less cutting from the book-
manuscript for serial usecutting out bits of philosophy which will (I
think) be of considerable value in the book and little or none in the
magazine. Wait till about the end of April, and you ll have the whole book
ms. When I come home we can at leisure go over the book ms and this
will be splendid I can lay it away for several months and go over the
whole thing again just before you start setting, a year or so from now.

Coming home

Both because I m very comfortably settled here, and living rather
quietly, and because when I do get home after a year and more of ab
sence there will be so many people and things that I ll want to see that
it d be hard for a time to settle down to work, I don t want to leave till
I have the book revised and done. Then I ll leap on a steamer (leaving
Grade and the kid here, till Wells s school year is done, or even for all
summer) and skip back, see you, go over the book if you want to, go out
West and see my dad, and generally cruise around, possibly spending next
summer in the Canadian wilds to get some outdoor life after this sedentary
year of writing and doing but little else.

Incidentally, Paul will get very little on the serial. He owes $10,000
on advance, and he owes me $1100 (approximately). Between having to
accompany me to the West Indies, then here, outfit Rhea, and bring her
over, he couldn t do it on a thousand a month, so I let him have some
more, and told him not to repay it till money came in from the bookhe
wanted to repay it some time ago when, being settled in London and able
to economize, he got ahead of the game again. It might as well wait till I
get home, then we can settle it all up.

Oh. You had to cable me several times in re serial. Be sure that all
these cables are charged to my accountbetter have someone look it up,
because they quite possibly were not so charged.

150 ARROWSMITH

I feel very well and as soon as I ve had a good lay-off next summer,
preferably in the wilds Canadian woods or Rockies or some place to get
this book out of my system, I ll be ready to go at the next book. Ill talk
it over with you when I come home. It ll be, I think, either a lovely
detective story I ve enjoyed planning, or the big religious novel I ve
planned so long paying my compliments to the Methodist cardinals, the
Lords Day Alliance, the S.P.V., and all the rest not slightly and meekly
as in M St and Babbitt but at full length, and very, very lovingly. I think
it ll be just the right time for this novel, and I think I can do it con amore.
. . . And this one couldn t fossibly be serialized! . . . Perhaps I ll do
both-the detective thing will be short (100,000 or a little less). That we
might serialize, and publish just a year after Arrow/smith. Well see. In
any case, I suspect 111 still do a few more novels!

This is about the longest letter I ve written to you for a year, so it
starts the giddy new year with a bang.

Ever,
SL

My very good friend General C. B. Thomson will probably be coming
over to America to lecture this spring possibly immediately and I want
you two to meet. You ll like him immensely. He s a sure-miff British
brigadier who, after 26 years in the army (he s still under 50) winding up
with 1 8 months on the Supreme Council, resigned and went into the
Labour Party (note that our), because it was the only one that seemed to
him to have a program. But he seems as completely Tory and army as
anyone could want. He knows everybody from Ramsay Macdonald to
the Queen of Roumania, and he was the most charming of all the guests
we had in France last summer.

The third possibility for the next novel is a university-president story
do him as lovingly as I did Babbitt. Paul and I have talked of doing this
together. It would be great fun for us two to get off into the Canadian
wilds or the Rockies next summer, and plan it. Sooner or later, we prob
ably will do it. The only objections to making it the next one are that
people would buzz if we had two books together in succession and that
I long to deal with the religiousers soon.

[1924]

London, January 5
Dear Alf, Don, and Gus:

Not to be interrupted too much in the production of a masterpiece
of literature, I m answering Alf s note and Gus s letter and Don s all in
this one, with much New Year s greetings to all of you.

[1924] 151

Pm awfully glad of the Stuart Sherman review of Weeds. I sent off
last week a letter to the N.Y.Sun about Weeds and Elinor Wylie s splen
did Jennifer Lorn God I wish we could have kept her, now! 1 deliber
ately designed to start some discussion, decidedly con as well as pro, and
perhaps help the two books a little.

I VERY much approve Don s suggestion of Monty Belgion as an ad
dition to the shop. I know that he would like to go to America; I know
that though he writes more or less he looks forward to a career in some
thing like publishing rather than writing; I know that he would, every
thing going well, be perfectly satisfied to stay in the States for good. He
is not only industrious and capable but an extremely good fellow; one
who would fit beautifully with the somewhat unusual spirit of the house.
... I find him one of the few Englishmen to whom I can talk with per
fect ease. . . . He has, or would acquire, the peculiar American virtues
without losing the English ones. Yes, do go ahead on that.

Arnold Bennett wants me to "do" the great and heroic days of the
early railroad building say the Great Northern or the Union Pacific.
That came out the other night. We had him for dinner with Sir George
McClaren Brown, head of the Canadian Pacific in England, and when
SGMB and I were being profuse about those great days, Bennett, says he,
"You ought to do that; it s never really been touched; you ve scolded
enough so you can be romantic for once with a clear conscience." Worth
thinking of. I once did talk of a Jim Hill novel. It wouldn t come, then,
but perhaps it might.

New Year felicitations.
May you enjoy Lady s Day,
Twelfth Night, and Boxing Day.
SL

January n
Dear Red:

If you are in such danger of getting the British point of view about
business as your suggestion that we charge cable tolls to you on the serial
sale, it s time you came home and stayed a while. Except for this indica
tion, I m pleased you thought of it. We never did and won t again.

What you say about the next novels is interesting, of course, and we
have all read it here. But the best fun will be to talk all this over when
you come back.

Yours,
Atf

i Harcourt, Brace published Elinor Wylie s volume of poems Nets to Catch the
Wind in 1921, but rights were later transferred to Knopf.

152 ARROWSMITH

January 25
Dear Sinclair:

After being kept at home for a few days with a hard cold, it was good
to find on my desk your letter of January 5th. All this was last week, but
the approaching wedding x brought some local excitement which put the
thought of writing to you out of my mind. This was last Saturday, as you
already know. Alfred returned to the office Wednesday morning after an
unextended trip.

When I wrote you about Montgomery Belgion, I didn t know that
Miss Eayrs would be leaving so soon, and I merely had her leaving in
mind as something that would happen perhaps next summer. Certain ad
justments have to be made immediately, and I can t tell how or when we
could use Belgion until the future is a little clearer. I am glad you thought
of him as I did.

Thank you for selling Weeds to Cape. I had almost given up hoping
to find an English publisher with the nerve to do it. Tt will be fun to see
General Thomson whenever he arrives. I remember him from the Sunday
luncheon at the Webbs . It s good to realize that we are going to see you
before many months.

Ever yours,
Don

London, Feb. 9
Dear Alf :

Thirty-nine, day before yesterday. I m becoming an antique! I vastly
appreciated the cablegram signed Alfdongusellenjeshal, and the signature
struck me as so Oriental, so Kubla-Khanish, that I evolved the enclosed
noble poem.

Alfdongus Ellenjeshal

King of the Eastern Riding,

Tall as a temple of Bal,

Swift as an evil tiding,

His dolorous people guiding

Rode with his white queen Zal,

A golden tempestuous gal,

Into the vale of Xiding,

His runners beside him gliding,

Shouting "Pashaw and Pal!

Emperor Ellenjeshal!"

1 The marriage of Ellen Eayrs and Alfred Harcourc

[1924] 153

You will have noted before this that our friend General C. B. Thom
son won t be coming over to lecture for six months or a year or six years
or something like that, because he has been made Minister for Air, and
been given a peerage. The British certainly know how to lay on the
nomenclature: "Secretary of State for Air, Brig. General the Right Hon
orable Lord Thomson, P.C, D.S.O."! Now that s what I call a name!
C.B. is quite unspoiled by his honors (honours) and takes them and him
self and sometimes even the Labor (Labour) party with a chuckle.

The book rolls on evenly. In about four days I ll be sending off
another 25,000 words to Haggard. Regarding the first 40,000 he has cabled
me, "Story splendid."

There s something (where have you heard these words before?) I
wish you would do for me. I may take up the preachers in the next book,
and I want to make some plans. Can you get and send me the chief peri
odicals of the Methodist and Baptist churches not so much the ones that
would be read by the laity but by the preachers, if there are such peri
odicals. And there is a magazine devoted to the business of evangelists.
I d like to see a copy of that. I doubt if you could get these at Brentano s;
I think they d have to come from the Baptist and Methodist publication
offices. (For God s sake don t let em know who it is as wants em!) Could
you have someone get these for me?

All well and cheerful. Been seeing millions of people. Spike Hunt
sends his love to Don (he s just back from America). Infinite personal
greetings, Alf.

Ever,
SL

February 9
Dear Red:

You can imagine how pleased Ellen and I have been over your warm
and friendly letter which came to Mount Vernon the other day.

Ralph Block of Famous Players has approached me definitely about
the sale of the motion picture rights of the next book. Warner Brothers
are undergoing a sort of reorganization. I told Block that I felt we ought
to give Warner Brothers a chance to go on with your books if they
wanted them; that I thought we would not decide until you came home,
or until I had the entire manuscript. By that time, I think Warner
Brothers situation will be clearer and we will know what to do.

Ever yours,
Alf

154 ARROWSMITH

February 29
Dear Red:

Our birthday figures do begin to sound like middle age, but let s keep
the middle age part of it just a far-off sound. I will be glad to see that you
get the religious periodicals.

About Belgion. As whatever he should do here would be particularly
under my wing and as I have never seen him, I do not think it wise to get
after him. I have a little notion from what I have heard of him and seen
of his activities that he may be primarily an author and literary feller
rather than a business man, and the birthday figures of Don and me and
Hal, Spingarn, and Gus are now significant enough so that we ought to
take very few chances of spending three or four years training a man who
is not fitted to push at least one of us off the chairs we now occupy. We
are still young enough, though, so that we can take youngsters out of
college or little more than out of college and let them really learn the
business under our wings. Young Hilary Belloc x is here now, another boy
is coming in September out of Yale, and then a Rhodes scholar. We got
a likely youth from Harvard last fall and another from the University of
Wisconsin, and the folks who have been here with us are coming on
beautifully. It would sort of take the heart out of these boys to have
someone come in from the outside and pinch off the good jobs they now
see they have a chance of working up to. I rather cotton to the idea of
having a number of these youths around and letting it be a free for all.

Everything is serene here and business is humming.

Yours,
Atf

London, March 4
Dear Alf and Don:

I m skipping off to Spain with Gracic for a couple of weeks prob
ably be gone three weeks in all including the travel down. I have finally
completed 96,000 words of the story, of which 30,000 are now at the
stenographer s being copied and to be sent off to Haggard the moment I
return. . . . Haggard writes rne that he thinks if the whole novel is up
to the first 40,000 words, it will be the best thing I have ever done.

About the title for the book. We can settle that when I come home.
If Dr. Martin Arr&wsmith is too long, then I think the only desirable
contraction will be Martin Arrowsmth. He so definitely is Martin, more
than Dr. Arrowsmith; yet just to call the book Martin would be senti-

1 Son of Hilaire Belloc, the English writer. Young Belloc was on the staff of
Harcourt, Brace for a brief period.

[1924] 155

mental lady-novelistish and so would Dr. Martin. As for the Doc, which
suggestion Alf hastily scrawled after a bibulous lunch I spit! it would
be like calling Jude the Obscure, The Country Kid.

I hope you ll both have some free time and be able to read the book
P.D.Q. as soon as I come home (which, with this Spanish interlude, will
probably be mid-May) because I shall probably not stay long in NY City.
I expect to be able to go with a Canadian Government Indian Treaty trip
way up into Northern Saskatchewan canoeing, camping for a couple of
months, starting about mid-June, and before that I ll have to skip out to
Minnesota and have at least a week with my father.

Movies

I imagine it would be better to have Famous Players than Warner do
the Arro wsmith film, if there is to be one Warners are pretty damn
amateurish at everything but finance. ... I think I d wait till after Hag
gard has done a lot of publicity and advertising on the serial before closing
any bargain, and I d see to it that both Block and Warners do see that
advertising. It ought to whet their hungers considerably. I d ask $50,000
or more.

Despite the tiredness from long-continued concentration, and despite
the London fogs, I feel very well (as do we all) and I ll return to work
with bells on. I ll have the whole thing done by about mid-May all right.
I think you re going to be enthusiastic. Ah, but when I get to Neighbor!
That s going to be THE book. And in less than five years I shall get to it.

Fred Howe is here we lunched with him yesterday, and this after
noon I take him to the House of Lords on tickets Thomson (he s now a
peer) gave me.

And tomorrow SPAIN!

Ever,
SL

London, March 26

Dear Alf:

This in answer to your letter which was awaiting rue when I got
back from Spain. It was a good trip and, as we were shameless about not
doing our duty as sight-seers, a good loaf. Toledo is a particularly in
teresting and unspoiled town and both there and in Seville there s plenty
of Moorish architecture left.

I think we d better wait till I come home and talk about the annual
drawing of money for investment. However, it may be that I shall have

156 ARROWSMITH

only a few days in NY Fm due in Prince Albert, Saskatchewan, on about
June 8 and I may ask you and Don to do the actual investing.

Have I told you much of anything about the summer trip? I join a
Canadian Govt tripa "Treaty Party" which goes annually to the In
dians to pay them off, adjudge legal cases, etc. and for two or two and
a half months I shall be in complete wilderness in No, Sask., outdoors 24
hours a day, which will be just the thing to set me up after a year and a
half or more of much too sedentary life. I m glad to say that my doctor
brother will be with me. I ll be back in what we call Civilization by the
end of August and perhaps between then and December I ll go over the
whole Martin ms again, and carry out any changes on which we-all may
agree. Fortunately we have oceans of time, so everything would go all
right even if I could have only one day in NY on landing which depends
on when I finish the Martin work.

About Belgion: Use your judgment. I quite see your point about
youngsters, and admire you for it your way is exactly the opposite of
Doran and old Freddy Stokes, 1 neither of whom had any real notion of
training youngsters.

Ever,
SL

April 7
Dear Red:

Hendrik Willem (Van Loon) sends me the enclosed prospectus of
the Dutch edition of Babbitt. You can try your Dutch on it.

The Designer publicity is good. Seeing the title in print tends to
convince me that Dr. Martin Arrowsmith is too much of a mouthful for
a title, and if I had to say this minute it would be simply Martin Arrow-
smth. But all this can wait until you come, of course.

Yours,
Alf

April 9
Dear Red:

Glad to have yours of March 26th. Your letter is the first definite
word of the Canadian Government trip. It sounds fine. I only hope that
the mosquitoes don t eat you up, and aside from this detail it does seem to
me the ideal thing for you to do next. It will get you toned up physically

1 Lewis was employed as a manuscript reader at Frederick A, Stokes Company,
1910-1912.

[1924] 157

and do all sorts of good things to you. Of course we are a little disap
pointed not to look forward to a longer visit with you after you land, but
it will be perfectly simple to do our work together in the autumn.
It certainly will be good to see you again.

Yours,
Atf

London, Saturday April 12
Dear Alf :

I shall sail on the Scythia on May 10, arriving late May 18 or early 19.
My plans are to stay in NY to about May zyth, then a couple of days in
Chicagp, on to Sauk Centre, about six days there, then trip with the
Canadian government party, and be back late in August.

I expect to arrive home with the book quite all done. You might meet
the Scythia, if it doesn t arrive at too ungodly an hour, and plan for a
dinner. And will you please engage a room for me at the Chatham? And
we might all get right after the book. There won t be the final lookover
which I had to give when I came home with Babbitt.

I ll see Paul in Chicago on my way home, unless he happens to be in
the East. It ll be damn good to see you all, and I think you ll like the book.
I feel as well satisfied with it as I ever do with anything.

Next fall, probably, we ll find a house in Washington for the winter,
and stay put nearly a whole year . . . unless we go to Calif ornia ... or,
you know, maybe just a flyer down to South America.

Six million salutations.

Red

As I ll be out of sight all summer and as she wouldn t have any too
much fun without me at an American resort, Gracie is going to France
for the summer, then will join me about September first.

Could you call up Henry Mencken at the Amer Mercury, tell him
when I m coming, and ask him to arrange a party for some date between
May 19 and 26th at his and yourconvenience?

April 28

Dear Red:

Of course we are delighted to hear that you are coming and to know
of your plans with some definiteness. I ll telephone Mencken, reserve a
room for you at the Chatham, and we ll have a fine time while you re
here. Ellen and I want you to stay out at the house as much as you can.
Plan to be there several days, and I ll just stay away from the office and
go over the book.

158 ARROWSMITH

I ll meet you at the steamer and then take the book and read it in
twenty-four or thirty-six hours. I suggest that you play around for a day
or two while I am reading it and getting my head around it and then
spend two or three days with us mapping out useful things to do to and
for it.

I ll be so glad to see you.

Yours,
Alf

London, April joth
Dear Alfred Harcourt:

For the sake of small Wells I am returning to the States this summer.
I shall arrive on the Veendm in New York June 1 3th, I shall first go to
my mother in Forest Hills where I shall sit down in the midst of my
luggage to decide what is the best thing to do with my summer.

This last week I have been reading Martin Arrowsmth, most of it
for the first time. There is a depth, an intelligence, a bigness, and a beauty
about this book that seems almost epic to me. It has come to me that it is
absurd to read a Sinclair Lewis novel as if it were a Peter B. Kyne. It
should be read with leisure and with thought as we do the good books
which have lasted more than their generation. Do you think this rather
monumental of me? But you know, like Mrs* Merton of the Movies, I am
his "severest critic" as well as "his dearest friend."

Grace Lews

SIX

Travel on Two Continents

On May i$th Lews arrived in New York with the manuscript of Arrow-
smith md took up with the office details of its publication.

[1924]

New York, May Twenty-three
Dear Alf :

Do you remember that bird-I think he lives in Brooklyn whose
chief delight in life is taking a book that is already published and marking
on it the most marvelous corrections that have ever been made? He did it
with Babbitt and Main Street and found a number of errors that all of us
had missed.

Although he is an amateur he might be able to do it, for filthy lucre,
with Martin. As we have so much time before the publication of Martin
we might get him to read the galley proof, make a list of proof sugges
tions and make use of as much of them as we may wish. As I remember it,
his one fault is that occasionally when a thing is said sardonically he takes
it literally and makes a proof correction which is absurd. But he is one of
those geniuses who may be valuable to us.

Your loving little boy-go to hell!

Sinclair Lewis

After a few days Lewis headed for Souk Centre, from where he and his
brother were to start for Canada.

Sauk Centre, June 4

Dear Alf:

Your good letter this morning. I already begin to feel rested & start
off cheerfully for Canada tomorrow evening. My father is well but not

160 ARROWSMITH

awfully strong. . . . Send me a note now & then this summer so they ll
be here when I get back. My best to all of you.

Ever
SL

This was the last note Lewis wrote the office before starting for Canada.
In it he mentions a letter from Harcourt, no doubt written longhand, for
there is no copy.

June 23
Dear Sinclair:

I have just had an enjoyable half-hour reading the interviews from
Winnipeg. They are marvelously good, and the reporter who describes
his visit with you in the hotel room comes pretty near to genius. I know
you won t get this letter until after your trip is over, but the interviews
and the pictures indicate you are going to be fit to enjoy it.

For the sake of the record, I ll tell you that I met Grace at the
steamer on Saturday, the i4th, and saw her safely started in the direction
of the Forest Hills Inn. She and Wells are looking splendid and appear to
be completely fit. Grace is going to spend the night with us in Pelham
tomorrow night.

Martin is completely set up and we have proofs, which the movie
people are reading. I have also sent a set to Paul.

New York is full of the Democratic Convention this week, and after
lunch Alf and I watched the parade on Fifth Avenue, made up chiefly of
politicians in silk hats and policemen. Imagine the Police Glee Club, dur
ing a halt in the parade, singing "Sweet Kentucky Babe" and a lot of
similar songs on Fifth Avenue. It wasn t very different from the 4th of
July, 1897, i n m y sma ll birthplace in New York state.

It will be nice to see you soon, I hope, after you see this.

Ever yours,
Don

There *was no word from Lewis while be was en route until bis letter of
June joth.

lie a la Crosse
Sask June 30
Dear Alf-Don-Hal:

This is rny last chance to send you a note before vanishing quite
beyond post-boxes until I emerge at The Pas, Manitoba, some time be
tween Aug. 15 & Sept 5. ... This settlement (Hudson s Bay store,

[1924] 161

Revillon post, log cabins of Indian fishermen) tho it is 150 miles (by
canoe) from railhead has a postal delivery every single month!

The trip is going beautifully. I ve already quite lost my jumpiness,
my daily morning feeling-like-hell; haven t had a drink for eleven days &
haven t missed it in the least. I don t have to do any work at allthe
Indians do that but I paddle enough to get a lot of exercise. The ground
no longer feels hard to sleep on, & I wake at 4, ready for bacon & coffee,
with great cheerfulness. I shoot at ducks; catch pike; & listen to the agent s
stories he is a delightful fellow, knows the wilds, & has a sense of humor.
All goes beautifully & I hope it does with you.

Ever-
SL

^ ^

Dear Grace:

Yesterday I was really moved by the picture of "Babbitt. I stayed and
talked with the Warner people; they do not seem to think the picture will
make money. They say it did well when it opened in Los Angeles but it
has not done well in Boston. I told them I thought they could count on
almost any other part of the country but Boston to respond to the picture.

Ever yours,
Alfred

On July 8th Mrs. Lewis went with Wells Lewis to Nantucket Island,
Massachusetts, and there was a constant exchange of correspondence be
tween her and the office while Lewis was in Canada.

July 26
Dear Red:

I was really surprised by your telegram yesterday saying you were
again in touch with civilization. I meant to have two or three letters wait
ing for you at Sauk Centre, but the days have slipped by. Of course those
of us who have been holding the fort have been especially busy and it has
been a stinking hot summer. Most of the staff have been away on vacation
and there is still a number to go. Hal left for a cruise last night. I think he
plans to stop in and see Grace at Siasconset, where according to her letters
she seems to be enjoying herself.

There is nothing to report on the motion picture rights of Martin*
I have sent galleys to all of the leading producers and Ralph Block is the
most interested of the lot. Warner Brothers say they lost some money on
Main Street and expect to lose some more on Babbitt, and of course this

162 ARROWSMITH

has spread. The lack of success of these pictures makes the other pro
ducers a little wary. It may be that the sale will not be made until the
book itself is under way and we have an assured box office title for it.

We have done nothing but send out some galleys to the motion
picture people and in every case I have insisted that these be returned to
us after they have read them. It seems important to me not to allow the
book to be pawed over so far in advance of publication; in fact I have
steered the office away from it and have kept the reviewers from reading
it. I don t want anybody to read it and get het up about it and then have
a chance to cool off. Not that they would really cool off. I find that I like
the book more and more myself as I think it over, but you know how it
would be with the reviewer if he reads it now, and then next February
started to write an article about it.

Ellen and I and Hastings expect to leave about the tenth of August
for ten days or so. I think that is all the news. I ll write again if anything
occurs. Til bet you had a wonderful time. I would like one like it myself.

Ever yours,
Alf

The Tavern-on-the-Moors
Siasconset

Nantucket Island, Mass.
July ipth.
Dear Don:

I am having a better and better time. Fola LaFollette and George
Middleton are here. And yesterday I ran into my adored Marc Connelly
and Tony Sarg and Bob Benchley. Great fun.

Did you see the telegram from Hal which was forwarded to me from
your office kst week? It reads thus: "Weather fine and party is ahead of
schedule and I have cut off last loop of trip so am back at railhead feeling
superb real rejuvenation. Going Sauk Centre so hustle mail there and wke
present address and a funny and take day off to write me enormous letter.
Shall know plans better when see mail but unless you like to come to St.
Paul for bat shall probably go East in about three weeks."

Enough is enough apparently. The wilderness is all right in its place
but not too much of the same place. I do hope the creature will come up
here and love it as I do.

Grace

Lewis stayed in Sauk Centre until August fth and then drifted East by
way of St. Pcad, Chicago, and Detroit. He arrived in New York the end

[1924] 163

of August, and joined Mrs. Lewis at Siasconset. While he was there he
read galley proofs of Arrowsmith. There were several letters written back
and forth, principally about the proofs.

September 5
Dear Red:

A minor piece of business: The head of the English Department in
one of the large St. Louis high schools is making for us a collection of
short stories to be read by high school pupils. He is extraordinarily keen
about your short stories and urged us to make a collection of them some
day. I report this as backing up the suggestion I made to you when you
were in the office. Incidentally, he would like to include one of your
stories in his collection "Old Man Axelbrod." Have we your permission
to reprint it? I think a little of this sort of reprinting for high school
pupils is a good thing to steer them toward an author s complete work.
I often wonder how many new readers of fiction come into the market
each year a darn sight more than die off, I think.

I do hope you found Grace and the boy all right and that you re
enjoying the crowd at Siasconset.

Ever yours,

Alf

Have you tackled proofs yet? Mencken asked for an advance set again
the other day. I stalled him off.

Siasconset, September 6
Dear Alf:

Yes, use the "Old Man Axelbrod" story if you want to in the short
story collection. About a collection of my stories: As I m going abroad
for God knows how long, I ought to look them over before I go or else
take em with me, for examination and possibly revision. Now if I remem
ber aright, I gave all the copies I had of my stories to Ellen, just after
Main Street, and they re probably stored somewhere in the office.

No, I haven t done a lick of work on the proofs. I ve never been more
agreeably and profitably lazy than here, in this island of sea breezes and
moors. But I probably shall do quite a little work these next two weeks.

Don t stall Mencken off on the proofs so long that there ll be any
danger of his getting sore. I think he d respect release date if it was
emphasized to him.

See you soon. Love to Ellen, Don, Hal, Gus.

Ever,
SL

164 ARROWSMITH

September 19
Dear Sinclair:

Paul has been in this afternoon, explained that he will have to go
away without seeing you, and brought up the point of the acknowledg
ment to be made for his share in Martin. He suggests, either in small type
on the title page or in small type on a following page, simply this: "In
collaboration with Paul H. De Kruif." Or if this doesn t seem all right to
you, he wishes nothing to be said at all. You can tell us what you want to
do about this when you come in.

I hadn t looked at the book since I read the manuscript, and I find
myself neglecting other things to read the batches of proofs as they come
in from you. It s even better than I thought it was.

See you next week.

Yours,
Don

Mrs. Lewis went to the Forest Hills Inn, Long Island, on September
a few days before Lewis left Siasconset. In Ne*w York Lewis discussed
with the office the form of credit to be given to De Kruif in Arrowsmith.
The Lewises sailed for England on the France early in October. Lewis
read page proofs of Arrowsmith on board.

Bord S. S. "FRANCE"
Monday noon, October 13
Dear Don:

We are less than twenty-four hours from Plymouth. About this time
tomorrow we ought to be ashore IN ENGLAND! It s been a fine easy trip;
no very exciting people aboard but no one disagreeable. It s a fine ship in
every way, especially as regards food and service, and I recommend it.
The only rough day has been today she s pitching, rather, as I write the
typewriter shows an unmanly tendency to approach me then back off
from me.

Don t forget that all thru the page proofs the running heads have to
be changed to just Arrowsmith.

Feel fine, rested after the excitements of NY, for tho I ve worked
pretty hard on these damn proofs aboard, I ve also had the finest lot of
assorted sleep.

Ever,
SL
Lemme know what Paul says re credit page.

[1924] 165

October 30
Dear Red:

Your cable authorizing the change of the word "suggestions" to the
word "help" in the acknowledgment to Paul 1 has just come in. You
already know that everything else has arrived, and as far as I can see, there
will be nothing else for you to look at until you get the finished copies of
the book.

All Paul said about the acknowledgment was that he d be content
with a compromise in regard to that one word. I thought you wouldn t
mind this; hence the cable.

I hope you ll soon be settled down for a good winter. Everything is
flourishing here.

Ever yours,
Don

The Lewises stayed in London until November nth, and then went over
to Paris.

c/o Guaranty Trust Co.
3 Rue des Italiens, Paris
November 12
Dear Don and Alf :

We ve done nothing but loaf and get over the final rush in NY all
this month. Tomorrow morning, early, we re off for Switzerland, where
we ll put the kid in school for several months. Then we ll return to Paris
and there, and All Points South, view the wonders of the nation for sev
eral months till I feel like getting on the job again. I think the only sensa
tional thing this past month has been having Bernard Shaw in for tea. He
was charming, and very young, and his wife, of whom one has heard very
little, seemed to be a very real person.

Ever,
SL

e following statement of Lewis s obligation to De Kruif was printed in
Arrowsmith:

To Dr. Paid H. De Kruif I am indebted not only for most of the bacteriological
and medical material in this tale but equally for his help in the planning of the fable
itself for his realization of the characters as living people, for his philosophy as a
scientist. With this acknowledgment 1 want to record our months of companionship
while working on the book, in the United States, in the West Indies, in Panama, in
London and Fontainebleau. 1 wish I could reproduce our talks along the way, and
the laboratory afternoons, the restaurants at night, and the deck at dawn as we
steamed into tropic ports.

166 ARROWSMITH

November 2 1
Dear Red:

No news yet about the motion picture sale of Arrowsmith. I think it
will drift now until after the book is out. We have settled on March 5th
as the date of publication.

Paul and Rhea have been at our house for a day. They are apt to
settle down somewhere around here for a few months. I am just reading
the first two chapters of Microbe Himters, and they are fine.

As a piece of news: You remember Hal s friend Arthur Hildebrand
started last August with two others to sail from Norway to Labrador over
the Viking route. They have not been heard from since, and it looks as if
they were lost. It s a shame!

We have had a busy autumn. Nothing has had an extraordinary sale,
but the whole line has been moving, so that the year has been a good one.
We have already done just over 20,000 of A Passage to India, which is so
many more than the sale Forster has had before in America that he ought
to be pleased.

We are all heading up now to work on ArrowsTmth, and it s going to
be great fun.

Ever yours,
Alf

November 25
Dear Red:

I just have your note announcing your arrival in Paris. I envy your
having Bernard Shaw for tea. I always see him now in a raincoat, talking
and wringing his hands, as he did that day at Ramsgate. I hope by the time
you get this you will be all settled and comfortable wherever it is in
France.

We have nearly finished printing the limited edition of Arrowsmth,
and in a few days we shall begin printing the first regular edition of
50,000 copies. We may have to print more before publication, but this
will at least give us something to start on.

Paul is back here for the winter probably and has just found a flat in
Mount Vernon. We re all well and busy, the same as usual.

Ever yours,
Don

In the three weeks they were in Switzerland, there was no communication
from Lewis.

[1924] 167

L Elysee-Bellevue Hotel, Paris
December 1 1
Dear Alf and Don:

Hunting for a school for Wells in Switzerland we found a good one,
too, at Glion, just above Lac Geneve; an eight-day walking trip among
the mountains in the most glorious Indian Summer weather, with no bag
gage except a small rucksack; a week here looking for a suitable hotel.
And now we re settled down in this comfortable place out on, the Champs
Elysee, and I ve started my French lessons and reading Voltaire. We both
feel superb and being dug in here we see almost nothing of the Wild Boys
who do their drinking at the Dome or the New York Bar. Ve seen Fred
Howe several times.

About Jefferson: I ve read the Muzzey and Morse biographies, and
while I find Jefferson interesting, I m not really stirred to specialize on
himcertainly not yet. 1 But I am planning The Yearner, and second
novel, much bigger, containing the novel about the Methodist preacher
which I ve planned so long, but also other and more dramatic elements.

Well be here about two months, then off Eastward to Czechoslo
vakia, Greece, Turkey, or Lord knows where. If either of you are (is?)
planning to come over here, please make it enough before February i jth
so that I shan t be gone. Or make it May- June when I ll probably be back.

In advertising I think I should emphasize the "first novel in the two
and a half years since Babbitt" People may forget it s been that long.

I m most terribly sorry to hear about Arthur Hildebrand. Perhaps
there may still be a hundredth chance of his being at some Esquimo
village.

Tell Hal that if he can by some miracle be stirred to write to me, I ll
send him a handsome answer. Tell him that I may beg him to go off to
China and Siam a year from now. As for Paul, remind that low form of
micro-biologic life that he owes me about two letters now, damn him.

Ever,
Red

Paris, December 27
Dear Alf:

A quiet but agreeable Xmas. We spent the afternoon wandering
among the old tumble-down streets on the Butte de Montmartre. Arthur
Maurice is in town, and we dine with him this evening. So is Tommy

many years Harcourt kept suggesting Jefferson to various authors as the
outstanding comparative vacancy in American biography.

168 ARROWSMITH

Wells saw him on the street the other day and asked him to phone me
when he had time for lunch or something.

I don t myself know the exact dates of the first editions of my
books-that is, I hate to depend on my memory. I believe they re to be
found in Who s Who. I think in answer to your questions that I d in
clude The Innocents, but omit the Stokes boys book x -if later it gets
included, all right, but let s not facilitate the process, and meantime most
copies of it, lying dusty in boys libraries, will have vanished from the
collectors ardent view.

Cape writes me that he is coming over. When he gets there, discuss
with him whether it would be better to send English or American edi
tions to people in England. AND, besides the individual doctors, the edi
tors of medical journals, the A.M. A, officials, and the college bacteriolo
gists, HAVE PAUL make out list of other scientists to whom it should go in
advance. Talk over with him whether, perhaps in some guilty hope of
starting controversies, it ought not to go to people e.g. Flexner who
may not like it quite as much as those who will.

Then what about the big foreign scientists besides the British? Talk
that over with Paul. I suggest specially D Herelle (who is mentioned
so much), Roux, D Arrhenius (oft mentioned), Bordet, Gratiot. If Paul
can get the American, British and Continental scientists to write either
for the press or at least to him Talk over for his letters a delicate
phrase which may suggest that to them.

Finally, what about sending this to the big critics everywhere? What
about Spingarn or you sending it to Brandes, Croce, et al? What about
sending it to James Joyce in Paris, Gilbert Seldes and Wilson Follett and
other highbrows in America? And just for the fun of it, to Freud, Jung
and Adler and see if they ll roast it among their disciples? And get off
copies for translation-agents as early as possible may get good European
reaction, esp. in Germany.

Grace suggests, apropos of my hint tother day of Britishers who
might review book for America West, Wells that they ought NOT to
have May Sinclair do it; as she did Babbitt, it will begin to look like log
rolling. Have some one get after Edith Wharton early perhaps cable her
with prepaid reply it would not be easy to get her, but valuable if pos
sible.

Ever,
Red

and the Aeroplane, Frederick A. Stokes Company, 1912. Lewis wrote this
under the pseudonym of Tom Graham.

[1925] 169

[1925]
January 7
Dear Red:

I am glad you are comfortably fixed in Paris, that you re feeling
well, and that The Y earner is continuing to take shape. The new season
has started off with a bang; we seem to have been more than unusually
rushed getting samples ready for the spring books and getting the travelers
ready to start.

Ernest (Brace) and his wife left for Paris on New Year s Eve on the
Ohio, planning, I think, to stay there at least for part of the winter. I
expect to come over in the spring. Our plans are to leave here the end
of March, probably go straight to Italy, and then come to Paris, spending
probably three weeks altogether on the Continent, which would bring
me to London about one month after leaving New York. Or I could
just as well reverse the route, going to London first and around the other
way. Unless we fail to make suitable provisions for the rest of the family,
Ida * will come with me. I certainly want to see you.

Louis Untermeyer, Paul, Chris Morley, Hal, Alf, and I have just
been having lunch, interrupting the ribaldries long enough to talk about
ArroivsTmth and you. I can t see anything in sight this spring to compete
with A. in any real way nothing within miles of it in scope, or depth,
or any kind of importance. I ve been rereading here and there from the
printed sheets it gets me more each time I go back to it.

Ever yours,
Don

Early in December the -fly-leaves for the limited edition of Arrowsmith
had been sent to Paris -for Lewis s signature.

Paris, January 10
Dear Alf:

I cabled you day before yesterday that I have not yet received the
fly-leaves for the special edition. They ve probably been caught in the
Xmas mail,

Fve had photographs taken by Man Ray, an American who follows
after Stieglitz, Steichen, etc. I m awaiting proofs and will send you the
best.

After I had suggested various bacteriologists to receive advance
copies of Martin, it occurred to me that there MIGHT be a danger that
too many editors of reviews might have the bright idea of having the

1 Brace s wife.

170 . ARROWSMITH

book reviewed by a scientist. One or two such reviews would be fine;
too many would be fatal it would suggest to the public that the book
was not a piece of literature but a scientific manual. So don t suggest
profs as reviewers to too many. I hope Carl Van Doren will do the book
for somebody, and that Stuart Sherman himself will be moved to do it
for the Evening Post. And Menck of course.

I m still loafing but beginning mildly to think about novels. But it ll
be some time before I go to work. I m thinking about a month or more
in Germany. Meantime I learn some French ... a little!

I have a letter from one Leon Kochnitzky, who was secretary to
D Annunzio during the great Fiume days, whom I met in Rome, and
who has been in Russia recently, that one Domher wants to write to you
about Russian rights. I m answering "sure, let him write if he has a
publisher interested." . . . ARE there any publishers in Russia except the
State? I don t know. But Louise Bryant tells me there are a lot of Rus
sians interested in my books, and I should suppose that at best we d get
darn little out of Russia in money, so it doesn t much matter who pub
lishes there. . . . Happy New Year.

Ever,
Red

January 15
Dear Red:

Yours of December 2yth came in the first of the week. The day was
a hectic one, as Don had to have an emergency operation for acute ap
pendicitis. It was a close squeak for him, but last night his temperature,
pulse, and breathing were about normal, and I really believe he is out
of the woods.

The only thing that isn t going right is the flyleaves for the special
edition. We are having them traced. If they do show up, may we have
a cable so that we will surely wait to bind them in the books?

We are waiting for the special photographs. Ellen and Hal are at
tending to the advance copy stuff. Paul has read your letter and is mak
ing notes, and he and Ellen are going to devote Friday to getting that
part of the job in shape. In one thing I am sure you have gone a little
too far in suggesting free copies. For instance, "professors of bacteri
ology in ALL American medical schools, and in all the larger colleges and
universities." We mustn t cheapen the book by being too free with it.

While we are working up the critical reception of the book with
a good deal of care, I am devoting most of my attention this time to
getting the trade started. After all, they are the folks who hand out the

[1925] 171

copies on which we pay you royalty. Gehrs has worked out a really
clever advance order scheme. We will have a dummy of the book, the
inside of which is really an order blank, with a little poster projecting
from it, on the front of the fiction counter in each of the stores for three
weeks before publication. I explained the scheme to Marcella Hahner
yesterday, and I told her I d give $25 to the girl in her store who had
the most orders booked by the morning of March 5th. When she saw
how it works, she said she d be disappointed if they did not have 1000
retail orders on the day of publication. That means 1000 people from
her store alone will be reading the book immediately and talking about
it. It is important for us to emphasize this aspect of Arrowsmith for a
number of reasons. The main one is that Babbitt seemed to stop so sud
denly that there were some copies of it around for a considerable time.
Another reason is the serialization. These give the booksellers excuses to
cut down their advance orders. We have to do something to get them
thinking in terms of 250 and 500 for their first orders instead of 50 and

100.

We now have a full page on the book every week in The Publishers
Weekly, so that booksellers will know for dead certain that the day after
Calvin Coolidge is inaugurated they will have nothing else to do but sell
Arrowsmth.

No more now.

Yours,
Alf

Paris, January 25
Dear Don:

I ll wait here in Paris for the new set of fly-leaves. Otherwise I d
be off to the Riviera right away not because I don t like Paris but be
cause I want to see a lot of other places in the few months more of
loafing which I can take. ... As soon as I have them off to you, Grace
and I will be leaving, with Germany probable after Riviera. ... I don t
believe we ll go out as far as Constantinople, though we had thought of it.

Where I ll be when you arrive in Paris I don t know, but I ll plan
to meet you here or in London when I know your dates more definitely.
I saw Ernest and Reeves (Brace) a couple of times here. They are now
off to Vence, a little and, I am told, very agreeable town not far from
Nice.

Ever,
Red

172 ARROWSMITH

January 26
Dear Red;

I have your note of January loth. Ellen and Paul have worked out
the list of bacteriologists who are to receive Arroivsmith. I was at once
aware of the danger of there being too many reviews by scientists, and
I have already squashed a scheme or two in that direction, especially with
Canby who has decided that he is very anxious to review it himself. The
scientific reviews with one or two exceptions ought to be confined to
the scientific journals. We will need two or three of just the right com
ments from those sources, but not more, and I want that crowd to realize
that they have gotten into literature and that they should buy and read
the book rather than expect to have copies given to them.

Cape s steamer is due today, and I suppose he will be in tomorrow
or the day after, Don got home from the hospital yesterday.

Yours,
Alf

Paris, January 28
Dear Alf:

I was frightfully worried to hear of Don s illness. I hope that long
before this he will have been out of danger. About the time you get this,
or a little after, I ll be off to the Riviera.

The damned fly-leaves for special edition never showed up till yes
terday afternoon, and I ve sent them off to you today. The three original
packages are now in one package together vwth ten new photographs
just taken here.

I m a little sore about Paul s being unable to find time to write me
one single line in about four months. You may show him just that, if
you d like. . . . If he has ever written, I haven t heard from him since
the letter which came to me just as I left Nantucket. . . . Meantime
I ve written him at least three timeswhether postcards or long letters.

Many ideas about The Y earner. Agreeable days with Bill Woodward,
now in Paris, and beautifully grown since the days of the Publishers
Newspaper Syndicate, and Mencken s great friend, Philip Goodman, the
theatrical manager a hell of a good fellow.

So! Now you can catch your breath.

Ever,
SL

[1925] 173

Paris, Feb i
DearAlf:

I m going to write a play! I shall enjoy it in contrast to novel writ
ing, and it will only take me about three weeks. I shall be working more
or less with Philip Goodman, who will then produce it some time this
year. We re going off to Munich to do it in a few days now. Then,
probably, Riviera. Meantime Yearner grows and rounds itself.

Ever,
SL

Paris, Feb. ist
Dear Don:

I was shocked and distressed when I heard from Alf of your opera
tion but, as I have had no further news, I let myself hope that you are
convalescing beautifully. I saw with Gracie the extremely beneficial re
sults of an appendicitis operation and I hope it will be the same with you.

How will this affect your plans about Europe? Just now I m going
up to Munich for about three weeks; then Gracie will either join me
there or we ll go to the Riviera. In any case, I shan t go out to Con
stantinople, and I ll be in reach whenever you come.

Drop me two words whenever you are able. . . . Need I tell you
how heartily and completely Grace and I send you our affection and
good hopes? She has skipped off to Switzerland for a few days, to see
Wells. This morning I talked to her over the long distance telephone
they got the call in about ten minutes and it seemed so strange to be
talking from the flat plains of France to a place in the mountains, and
high ones, of another country!

Ever,
Red

Paris, Feb. 6
Dear Alf:

Today I started off the second emergency set of fly-leaves for the
special edition of Arrowsmth. Jeezus! Have you ever tried signing your
name 5oo-odd timeskeeping the sheets from getting blotted meantime,
whereby the floor about your table is covered with a snow of fly-leaves
and then going to a French emballeur (Gracie being in Switzerland for
a week to see Wells, who seems very happy there) and trying in damn
bad French to explain that you want thesehere carefully wrapped in

174 ARROWSMITH

strawboard for shipment to Amerique? Then you ain t been nowhere
and you ain t done nothin .

About Maurois. And Disraeli. I have seen Grasset, his French pub
lisher, twice; and thrice I have seen his very delightful secretary qui
s appele Alice Turpin and who speaks an admirable English but who is
completely French. And this noon, thanks to Dr. Dawson Johnson, di
rector of the American Library here, I lunched with Maurois himself.

The situation is this. Maurois is now writing a series of five short
things dealing with Goethe, Byron, and three others. And he has the
documentation for two books on Disraeli and Wilson yes, H.H. the
Late Revered Woodrow. But not a word of either of these has he writ
ten. . . . He is a very charming fellow (incidentally speaking perfect
English). He is, unfortunately for us, much interested in his business (he
is by profession a silk manufacturer or something of the kind) and in his
children his wife died some short time ago and he is devoted to them.
ALSO he is well pleased by Appleton in America, Lane in England.

I told him what a hell of a bunch of guys Messrs Cape and Arcour-
Braas were. There is a vague long-range possibility that you might have
with Grasset here in France something like the same relation you have
with Cape in England. . . . Ht is young about forty energetic, free
from silly tradition, and at the moment about the most successful pub
lisher in the country.

Fm off in a week now for Munich.

Ever,
Red

February 13
Dear Red:

Don is back at the office and in better trim than for a long time.
Ellen and I are starting South tomorrow afternoon for a holiday. We
will be away ten days or so.

Consider yourself damned in Ellen s best New England accents for
not having sent the photographs by first class mail and not having had
them taken earlier. The review copies of Arronvsmth to the monthlies
and weeklies of large circulation have all had to go with the best of the
old photographs we could find. Of course the new pictures will be darned
useful in special places, and we will make all the special use of them we
can.

About Paul: I am almost certain I have heard him talk of having
written to you, but I ll show him what you say. There is one thing you
can be dead sure of he has been most expertly and completely helpful

[1925] 175

in the advance publicity work on Arrowsmth. He spent days with Ellen
on it, and between them they have done a careful and scrumptious job.
We are already beginning to get a few letters saying that the scientific
crowd are pleased to have this special and unusual attention.

The news about your writing a play is splendid. You will enjoy the
work, and it is about time you pulled one. How long ago the first night
of Hobohemia seems!

Advance orders for Arroivsmth look to be thirty-five or forty thou
sand, but the big accounts are just beginning to come in. Mencken has
read it and is as enthusiastic as we could wish. You know he is now
syndicating a weekly article to 45 newspapers. His article on March yth
will be a review of Arrowsmithy and then he will do it over again in the
April Mercury. As you know, Hal is endlessly enthusiastic, and the stuff
he and Gus have worked on for the trade has been splendid. The book
grows on us all all the time.

Yours,
Alf

February 13
Dear Red:

I am back at the office after my operation, apparently in good con
dition. As far as I know, my plans for Europe will go through about as
I told you. I expect to sail for Naples on March 2 6th. Meanwhile I have
a lot to do, and Alfred is going to Florida tomorrow to get a holiday
before mine begins.

Spike Hunt came up to lunch day before yesterday, bringing recent
and good reports of you. Jonathan is here now, too.

Barring strikes, accidents, and other acts of God, I think you can
count on my being in Paris for a few days toward the end of April and
in London during the first two or three weeks in May.

Ever affectionately yours,
Don

Hotel Elysee-Bellevue, PARIS.

February 28
Dear Alfred and Don:

After two weeks in Munich Phil Goodman was called back to Paris
to see some one and also Munich is a town which, however sharming,
becomes a litde bit dull after a few days and so we have returned to
Paris to complete the work on the play. As soon as it is finished, which

176 ARROWSMITH

will be in from two to four weeks more, Gracie and I will start off for
a long hike through Germany and Austria.

We enjoyed Munich immensely, particularly as it centered about the
Kurt Wolff Verlag. No one could have been more charming than Wolff
and his wife. They had us at a couple of parties, as it was in the midst
of the Carnival, and in general did everything possible to make our stay
agreeable. Wolff strikes me as being one of the most intelligent and prom
ising publishers I have ever met, and I shall be glad if it is possible to
make an agreement with him for Arro wsTmth.

Gracie had sent to Munich and therefore I missed the new pam
phlet about me x which, she informs me, is amazingly charming and valu
able. I am glad to hear that the book starts in with a promising advance
sale and that Mencken is as enthusiastic as we had wished.

Having told you something like 16,347,222 times how much I ap
preciate your work on all my books, need I again repeat it on Arro*w^
smith? I would say if it were not for the fact that Phil Goodman is
sitting across the room listening in a great bronze buddha bored Hebraic
way to this letter when he wants to work on the play, and were it not
for the fact that the letter is being dictated to Ellen Barrows that as soon
as I get this God damned play done and as soon as I have had a joyful
hike in Germany, I shall go to work on The Yearner, which will nat
urally be the greatest novel which has ever been written in the northern
countries of southern Iowa.

Ever,
Red

Paris, Mar. 4
Dear Don & Alf :

The play is no good. It tends to be cheap & sensational; so I have
chucked it, absolute, & with pleasure I return to thoughts of Y earner
tho it will probably be a couple of months before I start writing it ...
in England, in the Tyrol, in Sweden, in Connecticut, or one (at least)
of those places.

So at last Grace & I start off on a real hike. As it s rather early, we
plan (tho you know how often we change our plans) to go from here
to Marseilles, Cannes, the Italian Riviera, then direct from Genoa to
Munich, on to Vienna & Budapest, to Berlin & possibly Stockholm, Rot
terdam & Brussels. ... I ll probably, therefore, see Don in London after
May ist rather than here. But I want him to keep me posted as to his

1 Biographical pamphlet Sinclair Lewis by Oliver Harrison (pseudonym for
Harrison Smith), issued by Harcourt, Brace.

[1925] 177

movements. From tine to time I ll wire from Xdzboda or some other
agreeable place.

I have Hal Smith s new pamphlet. It s a corker.

Ever,

March 6
Dear Red:

Arro wsTmth is published, and all the signs point to success. I was
intending to enclose with this letter a number of the early reviews, but
Hal tells me he is writing you and enclosing them. Stuart Sherman s re
view is splendid, and Canby s is good too. Hal has had a wonderful time
with the advertising and has managed things with much skill and of course
with no end of interest and enthusiasm. The advance sales are, we figure,
43,000. We shall have to start another printing the first of the week. It
is pretty clear from the early comments that there is going to be con
troversy of one sort or another about the book; everything looks favor
able.

I am due in Naples on April sixth. You might write me in care of
The American Express Company in Naples where you expect to be in
Paris the last few days in April and in London after that.

Ever yours,
Don

March 6
Dear Red:

The eventful day has passed. Last month there was a total eclipse of
the sun. This week New York had its first earthquake since the days of
President Grant and the police reserves had to be called out to quiet the
swarms from Harlem. Yesterday Arrowsmith was published. Today I am
writing you a letter. The connection between these events does not need
any astrologer.

In short, Arroivsmith is going over with a bang. There are reviews
everywhere publicity everywhereads everywhere. Vanity Fair devotes
a page to the photo with the twisted column and the enigmatic Lewis
at its base; Arts & Decoration (God save the mark!) another; the roto
gravure sections of newspapers will have you; and the women s maga
zines cry for them. Even the biographical squib by that imposingly un
known critic Oliver Harrison is selling and will probably have to go into
another edition. For ten days people have been going into the bookstores

178 ARROWSMITH

and trying to buy Gus s dummy copies which, with their virginal and
blank leaves are still a better buy than many of the new novels, having
the merit of complete honesty and the dramatic quality of suspense.

Up to date Canby likes Arrowsmith immensely; Stuart Sherman
thrusts back at that red-whiskered Boyd, and proclaims that it s your
best novel. His is a completely satisfying estimate of the book, at least
to me. Fishbein and Keith Preston in Chicago have come up to scratch.
It is all very exciting, and you ought to be here to flavor it. Laurence
Stallings, now out in Los Angeles working for the movies, is the only
discordant note so far, coming out with an abortive, brief and unfair
review which appeared two days before the book was out. Carl Van
Doren tells me he likes it immensely, and I am waiting breathlessly to
hear from that dean of American critics who is now (heaven help us!)
editor for Doran s, John Farrar.

This will have to serve as a brief resume of the latest dispatches from
the front. To be concise, you have captured the American front line
trenches of the enemy. In another week Gus will have the entire public
on the run into the bookstores.

Personally I am well, cheerful, and wish to God spring was here.
The same to you! A letter from Gracie says that you are in Germany
with one Philip Goodman, and I can only wish that his name was Harri
son Smith. But still, perhaps he knows something of that accursed lan
guage, which I could never manage to twist my tongue around. How
ever, Europe is not for me for two or three years as yet, and why I
should think it should be then, I don t know. Are you really going to
the Orient? Knowing something of China and Japan, I recommend it
with all my heart. No one has really seen the world until he has been
there. You are beginning to do the job so completely that you ought to
absorb the saffron and the brown people and perhaps the black, although
if you are like me you will be more interested in the weird varieties of
whites you meet out there than in the natives.

Some good books out in the last few weeks, though nothing can in
the least degree rival Arr&wsmith Item: The Constant Nymph by one
Miss Kennedy, and God s Stepchildren by Sarah C. Millin.

If there is anything I can do for you, any messages I can bear, or
rears that I can kick, let me know. You will hear from me again. My love
to Grace, and if you will get yourself a bottle of good wine and pretend
that I have paid for it I will be satisfied.

Alf is down in Florida but comes back Monday. Don sails soon.
Paul is the same as ever, and he and Rhea are going to move into Don s
house and look after the youngsters while the Braces are away. We have
Spike Hunt s novel, and I am going to try to read it tonight.

[1925] 179

That s about all the news I can think of. Cape has been here and
goes back tomorrow. He is a good scout.

Yours,
Hal

March n
Dear Red:

With Don planning to sail for an eight or ten weeks holiday at the
end of the month, I suddenly realized that my last chance for a holiday
in some time was rapidly passing. And, during the last week before the
publication of Arrowsmith and the few days after it actually appeared,
there was nothing I could do for it all the wires were laid and the book
itself was at work so Ellen and I slipped away to Florida and had a
splendid time.

I spent last evening reading through all the reviews so far. They re
fine as a whole. A number of the reviewers are a little at sea as to just
how to take it. They re going to be ashamed some day of their "ifs" and
"buts." I am glad to see that most of them recognize Leora for part of
what she is just about the best woman character in American fiction that
I know of. I have no doubt that we shall surely sell 100,000, and I have
hopes that it is going much beyond that.

I have also read your letter about Maurois, Disraeli, etc. What a fine
and careful job of going to the bottom of a tangled situation!

While I was in Florida, I read Spike Hunt s novel and sent it back
to Don for him and Hal to look at. I said I thought we ought to try it-
it s honest and it s real. I haven t heard what they think of it. If they
share my hopes, we ll try it; if they share my doubts, we may not. 1

You must have enjoyed Munich and the play. I hope you and Grace
have a wonderful time in Germany and Austria. Then it s time tp start
writing another novel.

Yours,
Alf

Hotel Bellevue
Cannes
March 21
Dear Hal:

Yesterday, forwarded from Paris, came your letter & the first batch
of reviews & the big ad. God bless you! The ads are corking the use of
the arrow as symbol for the book is superb. I should think they would

i Frazier Hunt: Sycamore Bend, HB&Co., 1925.

180 ARROWSMITH

hit everybody square in the eye. Fm so glad, of course, of Sherman s
review.

We re off on a two months hikehere (Cannes is lovely, by the
way), Italian Riviera, Munich, Vienna, Berlin then, God knows. But
probably we ll be back in America in May, & I ll settle down to writing
the new novel, which I have been pondering endlessly. . . . The play
which I started with Phil Goodman proved N.G., & we chucked it; any
way we had two agreeable weeks in Munich.

You must plan to go out to Siam (via China perhaps, or India if by
way of Europe) in fall of next year.

Ever,
Red

Hotel de L Hermitage
Monte Carlo
March 26
Dear Alf:

I have your warming letter of March 1 1. Grace & I are really enjoy
ing our progress along the Riviera Cannes charming, Monte Carlo really
sensationally beautiful with its gardens between sea & abrupt mountains.
And we ve peered at Hyeres (Mrs. Wharton likes Arrowsmth best of
all), Marseilles, Carcassonne, Nimes, Avignon. . . . From here we go to
the Italian Riviera esp. San Remo & Porto Fino then north to Munich,
Berlin, Vienna. ... In eight weeks or so I ll be settling down to the
new novel, tho whether abroad or in U.S. we haven t yet decided. . . .
G. has had a touch of flu but she is all right now, & we feel fine. . . .
The new novel will be, I hope, not over 100,000 words, & be ready for
publication in fall of 1926 I hope and (I HOPE) be quite of the quality
of the last three. ... I think it should certainly not be serialized, & I
am enclosing a letter on that subject to the Designer.

Our most affectionate greetings,

Red
Any thoughts on pulling wires for Martin for Nobel prize?

[Enclosure]

March 26
Loren Palmer, Esq.
Butterick Magazines

Dear Mr. Palmer:

Greetings! I am writing from Monte Carlo the lights have just gone
on in Monaco across- the little harbor, the yachts are twinkling, and it is

[1925] 181

the perfect stage-set. What is perhaps more important is that I am trying
to get used to a Corona again after long use of a Royal, and my typing
hasn t perhaps the perfection it displayed when I used to be valet-secre
tary to the King of Iceland.

Your letter of March 10 has just come in. I am delighted that Arro f w-
swnth should have been enough of a success as a serial so that you should
want to hear about my next novel. But in the first place that novel isn t
as yet even started I ve been taking my first long loaf in years and in
the second place I doubt if it will be available for any serial use what
ever, both because as it now outlines itself in my head, it has no suitability
for serial use, and because I don t want to get into the habit of having
things serialized. With ArrovosTmth it was all right, because the novel
was complete, at least in its first draft, before I had the slightest notion
that it ever would be serialized, so I did not work toward that purpose
ever. But if I knew, or even rather thought, that the new book was to
be serialized, it would badly cramp my style rob me of the freedom
without which very few decent novels axe written.

One might say, "But why not just work ahead, forgetting all about
serial purposes, in complete freedom, then consider serialization after
ward?" Because one doesn t work that way; even a subconscious notion
of serialization would cause one to insert this and omit that especially
when one has had as dreadfully much practical experience in magazine
hacking as in the past I have had.

I m awfully grateful to you for your interest, please understand that
definitely, but unless I should happen to go broke some day, or happen
by an improbable chance to turn out something really splendidly suitable
to serialization some romantic interlude between longer books I don t
believe I ll ever have another book serialized.

Sincerely yours,
Sinclair Lewis

April 4
Dear Red:

I was awfully glad to hear that you are thinking of coming over to
this side before long. Seven months in Europe and five months here is
not a bad program.

Everyone is discussing ArroiDsmith, at least when I am around, from
all possible angles. One night I dined with a well-known children s special
ist who seemed to have been neglecting what little sleep his practice
afforded him in order to finish the book. He said that the medical pro
fession ought to offer you a vote of thanks for exposing all the cant,
hypocrisy and bunk that go with that job. The "tonsil snatcher" had

182 ARROWSMITH

gotten under his skin, just the same, and he assured me that for a long
time he had been intending to give up that lucrative branch of his work.

The attitude of the English critic seems to me to be much less com
plicated and more straightforward than the American, and I think the
reason behind it is that the American critic is not quite able to get over
a feeling of resentment which he is not willing openly to profess. You
have attacked American materialism (let us say) and you sell enormously.
Here are two crimes which irritate these gentlemen. The English critic
is delighted to have you strike at American crudities, since he belongs
to the country of Wells, Bennett, and Galsworthy, and he has sense
enough to know that a great writer may also be extremely popular. This
may seem nonsense to you, and anyhow it doesn t really matter. Over
here some of the adherents of the Boyd clique have come around to your
side. The Bookman published its first fair estimate of you as a writer in
Grant Overton s article, which I am sending you, and Burton Rascoe has
flung his floral tribute at your feet. The attitudes of Broun, Stallings and
F.P.A., representing the World, of course, have been curious. The book
has never been competently reviewed there, and after Stallings first re
view (which seems to me to be entirely unworthy of him) the paper
has said nothing beyond a few digs. Personally, I think Stallings is a little
shaky about it. He came in to tell me that you were a great man, that
he took his hat off to you, and that you were the greatest journalist writ
ing fiction since Dickens (whatever that means) . We are maintaining an
attitude of polite reserve accentuated by daily advertising in the World,
and it will be amusing to watch the final result. It s a rather interesting
illustration of American criticism, to my mind. Stallings, busy in Cali
fornia with a movie, reads the book and writes his review at a time when
he is too busy and too angry to write about anything, and certainly in
no mood to consider so important a book as a new novel by you. His
pride would not allow him to recant, and since he is attached to the
World the rest of the paper backs him up. Oh well, what s the use! As
Alice said, they are only a pack of cards. The writers whom I meet and
the people who merely live and read books now and then have no re
serves about it. They like it enormously.

Claire x sails on the Ordima on April 25th with the whole outfit, and
in addition her mother and aunt and a friend. I shall be on the job all
summer with the exception of a holiday cruise, and if you come back I
want to have you spend some nights with me on board.

We re having an interesting, exciting time just now around the office,
and it looks like a prosperous year. Extraordinary how fascinating this

1 Smith s wife.

[ 1925 ] 183

work is. You will be delighted to know that we have sold Sandburg s
life of Lincoln x to the Pictorial for a sum which gives him over $21,000.
It means putting the book off till next spring, but that can t be helped.
Sandburg is one of the most lovable men in the world and has always
been poor; I don t believe that he has ever been more than three or four
thousand ahead of the game at any time. You can imagine what it will
mean to him* This book of his is magnificent, and I doubt if it would
ever have been written without Harcourt. And incidentally, there is no
other publisher in America who would have had the intelligence to see
the latent possibilities in Carl.

Eh bien, spring is here and I am beginning to be restless. No word
from Hildebrand. It looks as if he were gone for good.

Good luck, old son, and don t forget to come back this spring. My
love to Grace, if she wants it.

Yours,
Hal

Hotel Continental, Miinchen
Apr. 8
DearAlf:

Fine trip: Riviera lovely; fine walks in hills near Genoa with Claude
Washburn; Monte Carlo & Alassio especially beautiful. In 5-6 days we re
off to Vienna, Budapest, Berlin. I think we ll probably come home late
in May, & settle down while I get busy with The Yearnerfor which I
have numerous notes, & which is now well-formed in my mind.

I don t know where I ll see Don probly not till May, in London.
I ve written to him in Naples.

Fve seen a lot of reviews thanks to HJB.&Co. And how go the
sales? ... All well & happy & interested.

Ever,
Red

April 10
Dear Red:

Yours of March 2 6th with letter to Loren Palmer is just in. You re
right about this serialization business. Serialization cut down our advance
orders at least 25,000, I should guess, and it dulled the edge of the event
which the publication of a new book by you should be. Advance sales
of Arro*wsmith were just over 40,000. Incidentally, our record of gifts
1 Carl Sandburg: ABRAHAJM LINCOLN: The Prairie Years, 2 vols., HB&Co., 1926.

184 ARROWSMITH

totals 1500. We sent it widely for review and to the book trade, and your
suggestions and Paul s ran into a large total. Most of this is worth while,
but 1500 is a hell of a lot of books, and, in general, I think a man thinks
more of a book he buys than he does of a book that s given to him. The
upshot of all this is that I think you re dead right in your state of mind
about your next book. We ll make the whole bunch hungry for it rather
than take the edge off their appetite in any way.

Heywood Broun has decided he likes the book, according to his col
umn this morning. He is rather niggling about it, but I enclose it. We
found from the Publishers Weekly that the book was the best-selling
novel in March, according to their reports.

Don gets to Rome tomorrow. He ll be home the end of May. Ellen
and I are rather planning to get abroad with Hastings for a few weeks
in July. Of course, wherever you are happiest is the place to write the
next novel, but I rather hope it is America.

I have looked into the Nobel prize procedure. Their prize is awarded
by a close corporation of professors consisting of 1 8 members. The pro
cedure seems to be foggy. I have made a delicate suggestion to Stuart
Sherman that he take some steps to that end from America. I have written
to Cape to see what he can get done in England, and I have asked him to
have your Swedish publishers see if they can start something in the Scan
dinavian countries, and I am sure Kurt Wolff would help.

Write when you feel like it, and of course let me have early word
of your plans if you decide to come home.

Ever yours,
Alf

Hotel Sacher, Wien
Apr. 1 8
Dear Alf:

Superb time in Vienna a Viennese baron whom I knew in Munich
came on here with us; he is youngish, very intelligent, amusing, & a damn
good banker; he s introduced us to a lot of people whom we like & most
of whom speak admirable English. . . . Vienna does not seem poor; there
are few outer signs of poverty, but they all say they re rather discouraged.
They look so to America.

To Berlin day after tomorrow, with a day in Prague on the way.
Fll see Don in London possibly in Paris. We ll probably sail before the
2oth of May. All well.

Ever,
SL

[1925] 185

April 24
Dear Red:

Much interested in what you say about coming home in May to start
the new novel. I am pretty sure it will be a good thing for you to write
it here. 1 don t know how dependent you have come to be on people
and change, but why not try it? There have been some nibbles on the
motion picture rights but nothing significant yet. Don is evidently having
a fine rime in Italy. You may be seeing him in London.

Has anyone told you that Gene Saxton has gone from Doran s to
Harper s? He is to be a side partner for Briggs. He sailed last week I
suppose to do what he can to dislocate some of G.HJD. s British authors.
It will be interesting to watch the developments both at Doran s and
Harper s.

Ever yours,
Atf

Lews returned to New York on the Albert Ballin at the end of May
with Philip Goodmm, Donald Brace, and their tvives.

May 29
Dear Red:

I am much disappointed not to be able to be at the steamer to meet
you. Six weeks ago I made an engagement to go with some friends up
to the Arlington Valley over the Decoration Day holiday. You will re
member I have headed in that direction at this time of year for a long
time. I remember the trip you and Grace and Hastings and I had there
just three years ago. I really can t get out of the trip now, especially as
I have told Dorothy Canfield about it, and she has the manuscript of her
new novel for me to read. I will be back Tuesday night. Of course I
don t know what your plans are, but I do contemplate your being in this
part of the country for at least long enough for us to have a real visit.
There is your old room and a warm welcome for either or both of you
at the house.

I don t understand what has happened to the book market this spring.
Hood told me their sales of fiction for the last three months had been
between fifty and sixty per cent of normal. Perhaps the public is pausing
for breath before they decide to go off on another reading bust maybe
in a new direction. We will know more about that in the autumn.

I have had letters from Don in London saying you were in great
shape. I am eager to lay eyes on you.

Yours,
Alf

186 ARROWSMITH

The Lewises remained In New York until the middle of June when th$y
rented a farmhouse for the summer at Katonah, New York. During this
time Lewis s contact with Harcourt, Brace was through personal visits
and the telephone.

Louden Farm,
Katonah, New York
Aug. 26
Dear Don:

As to book form of short stories, etc.: My story "The Willow

Walk" appeared in E. J. O Brien s annual Best Short Stories of for,

I think, 1918. And my article on Minnesota appeared in The United States
(I m not quite sure of that title) published by Liveright (1924 or 1925). x
And I have a piece in a co-operative book on the short story edited by
Blanche Colton Williams, 2 published when & by whom God only knows.
And haven t Harcourt, Brace & Co. published one of my short stories in
a volume edited by somebody from the West? 3

Cheerio,
SL

Lewis came down to New York and stayed at the Shelton Hotel all of
October.

New York, October 3
Dear Alf :

I told you so! I knew that the Brooklyn wizard of proofreading
might easily take a whack at Arrowsmith, and God Almighty look at the
things he has found in a book said by all scientists to be totally free from
error.

Of course it would be impossible to make many (it may be impos
sible to make any) of the corrections indicated by him. I have red-penciled
a few which you might care to use if there is ever another big edition
of Arrowsmith. I don t, for instance, see why in the phrase "smart aleck"
I should capitalize the "Aleck." True it was once a definite reference to
an unknown gent named Aleck, but now it has come to be a phrase with
little consideration of the personal in it.

You may remember I said the one trouble with Feipel was that he
had almost no sense of humor. This is clearly indicated on the last page

1 These United States edited by Ernest Gruening, Boni & Liveright, 1924.

2 Book of Short Stories, Appleton, 1918.

8 "Young Man Axelbrod" in Short Stories edited by H. C. Schweikert, HB&Co.,
1925.

[1925] 187

of his letter where he questions "feetball coach" in which Pickerbough
was, of course, trying to be humorous. And when he says: "What are
we to understand by told G.U. stories (17), wimpish little men (288),
a scad of money (331), and club-tie* (410)?"; of course it isn t my fault
if he doesn t get the implications any more than it would be his fault if
I didn t get the implications in a letter of his.

If you want to make the red-lined corrections, you have my bene
ficent permission. Don t forget him as a person some day to be used on
a book of, for instance, the type of Mencken s American Language in
which, as a scholarly work, every syllable is subject to the most carping
criticism (though why a carp should criticize is a question to be decided
not by me but by Mr. Feipel).

Yours sincerely,
Sinclair Lews

In this period Lewis had been at work on a short novel in which he used
the Canadian trip as background. It was written primarily as & serial.

The Shelton, New York, October 24
Dear Alf :

Collier s will publish the last installment of Mantrap in their number
for June 4, and they agree that you may publish the book any time after
June i st. I should think it might be a good thing to have it not later than
June 3 so that it will catch most of the outgoing trans- Atlantic business.

Yours sincerely,
Sinclair Lewis

At the end of October Lewis sailed -for Bermuda and stayed at the Hotel
Frascati. Mrs. Lewis rented George Arliss s New York flat for the win
ter, at 1 57 East jfth Street.

November 6
Dear Red:

If Mantrap is to appear in June, it should be in our spring announce
ment list and have the benefit of the entire range of spring traveling. So
it is time to ask you for an almost final decision on book publication.
You have had all sorts of advice from all sorts of people on the question,
but you know the considerations perfectly well yourself and your name
goes on the book. Now that you have been away from us all for a little
while, it will, I think, have fallen into order in your mind so that you will
have a sure hunch as to what is best to do. So will you take a walk, think
it over, and let me know?

188 ARROWSMITH

Everything serene here; we miss your visits. I hope Bermuda is fun.
Shall be glad to have letters and know how you fare.

Yours,
Alf

Hotel Frascati, Bermuda
November 10
Dear Alf:

I am extremely happy to be in Bermuda. I like it just as much as you
said I would. After a week of loafing except for a book review for
Canby I am feeling superb and now into the play with all four feet. I
should think I shall be here another three weeks.

I still don t see any reason why we shouldn t publish Mantrap as a
book. Looking back at it I recall nothing shoddy in it, and as for the
critics who insist that I have no right to do anything but social docu
ments, they may all go to hell. I have pretty much worked on that theory
with them anyway and I have seen no evil results. I am enclosing a sheet
giving my idea of a description of the book, and from it you may get
one or two suggestions for your descriptive material.

Regards to all the shop,

Ever,
Red

P.S. I am enclosing a letter from the man who is interested in an Italian
translation of Babbitt. Will you please take care of this? Ordinarily, of
course, we refuse to give any one person the exclusive rights to trans
lations. But from what I know of Italian publishers, I rather think that
this man is absolutely correct in saying they are tricky birds to deal with
and that, if they got the right to the book, they would be very likely to
hire the cheapest and least competent person possible to do the trans
lation. In any case the amount of money Involved will necessarily be very
small and we can t lose more than a couple of billion Russian roubles,
which is the precise price of a drink of Canadian Club in the happy isle
of Bermuda.

I have a letter from Mrs. Brody, the translator of Babbitt and Arrow-
swtith, saying that Kurt Wolff has decided after all to bring out Arrow-
STnith complete, without any cuts, although they will have to make two
volumes of it, amounting in all to about 800 pages. It seems to me that
those people are really giving every conceivable effort to doing a splendid
job, and I m damned glad that we are hooked up with them. As soon as
you set up Mantrap send proofs over to Wolff they will probably faint

[1925] 189

with joy at having at least one short book to translate . . . providing
they don t think the damned thing is too lowbrow for the German
savants.

Equally ever,
SL

The correspondence with the office continued while Lewis was in Ber
muda and dealt chiefly with matters pertaining to Mantrap proofs, jacket
drawing, descriptive material, and a possible sale of film rights.

Bermuda, November 26
Dear Alf :

I shall leave here on December mh and be in New York on the i4th,
going to the Shelton. According to the way the steamers run, I shall not
be able to get any mail sent later than noon of December 4th.

The play goes on well and I feel fine. It has been a good stunt coming
here. There may be a letter or two coming from you on the next two
steamers (before the 12 days during which there will be no steamers at
all) but in any case I ll see you in about two weeks.

I do hope you have called up Gracie once or twice and perhaps had
lunch or something with her. I am going to the Shelton when I go back,
but I shall certainly have Christmas with her and I hope for any number
of agreeable teas and that sort of thing without impairing either her
independence or mine.

Ever,
Red

After returning from Bermuda on December 24th, Lewis remained in
New York and spent Christmas and New Year s in the city. A couple of
weeks later he went to Kansas City to get material from friendly ministers
for Elmer Gantry.

ELMER GANTRY

SEVEN

Portrait of a Preacher

[1926]

Linwood Boulevard Methodist Church,
Kansas City, Missouri
Jan 23d
Dear Don:

Here s end of galleys (of Mmtrap). I ve never been so busy in my
life as I have been here, rushing around being took to warious organiza
tions, but I feel fine & it s been darn valuable, darn interesting. Stidger *
is a corker (& his book sermons are excellent) & has helped me a lot on
preacher novel. I leave here for Santa Fe on Thur. to begin loaf-Fll buy
car there or El Paso, depending on weather. Regards.

Ever,
SL

La Fonda Hotel
Santa Fe, New Mexico
Feb. 3
DearAlf:

By this time you will know from my telegram that I found it rather
cold here and that I am going on to San Francisco and work back buying
a car there so as to see this country again in warmer weather. But cold
or not it has been interesting. I spent a night at an Indian pueblo with
Mary Austin and some other people in order to be there to see an Indian
buffalo dance the next morning. And a damned good spectacle it was.

I got more out of Kansas City for the preacher book than could be
imagined; it was not only Bill Stidger I wrote to Don how really excel-

1 William L. Stidger, pastor of Linwood Boulevard Methodist Church.

194 ELMER GANTRY

lent his book sermons are, and I hope you send him out all the books he
wantsbut at least a dozen other preachers of all denominations who
varied from mild sympathy to real friendliness. I am going back there to
start planning the book, as I can ask any one of these dozen or more
preachers for the information I want, stay there a couple of months, and
after that . . . God knows! I feel fine and think the adventure is in every
way a great success.

Ever,
SL

February 9
Dear Red:

I am risking this to the St. Francis in Frisco. Your letter of February
third came in yesterday. I was away then; my mother has had a slight
stroke and I had to go to see her. In fact, Don and I were having a little
holiday down in South Carolina when I was called back on account of
her illness. Don is sticking out the two weeks. I saw Collier s this morning
with the initial installment of Mantrap. They seem to play it up nicely.

I am endlessly pleased at the tone of these good letters from you.
They sound as if you were having fun and going strong and running your
own show. I have had some nice letters from Stidger. You can t imagine
how pleased he was to have you with him. When Don and I were in
Washington, I saw the big weather map in the station there and noticed
how cold it was at Santa Fe something like 26 degrees the day before
and we said that you would not be hanging around such cold parts long.
I think it is sensible for you to go back when it s warmer. Keep traveling
and working, and you ll be happy. Good luck!

Ever yours,
Alf

Hotel St. Francis
San Francisco
Feb. ii
Dear Alf:

San Francisco at last, and in a few days will start driving Eastward.
I have a couple of ideas which I wish you would think over. You may
have noticed two articles by George Sterling in the Mercury recently,
one on Joaquin Miller and one on Ambrose Bierce. I wonder if we could
get George to do a whole book on the golden days of California literature,
with such personalities as Bierce, Miller, Jack London, Gertrude Ather-

[1926] 195

ton, Stoddard, etc; the old days of Carmel and Monterey; the early days
of the good San Francisco cafes, and the Bohemian Club, and so on. It s
not so much that any of these people, except London, were very impor
tant, as that the old Ufe was peculiarly brilliant, gay and romantic, against
a romantic background. Much of this George has gotten into the Miller
article in the February Mercury. I think he might be tempted to do the
book if you were interested, and if you are you had better get after him
before Knopf does.

The other idea is a kind of Funk and Wagnalls stunt in which there
might be a few agreeable millions. Is there at the present moment any
good up-to-date household medical book "doctor book"? If there is not,
I don t see why one could not be sold to almost every household in the
country. My idea would be to have it edited by someone like Dr. Morris
Fishbein, editor of the Journal of the American Medical Association.
Certainly as editor of this great sheet, Morris could get hold of the best
people in the country. My idea would be to have chapters done by people
as well known as Will Mayo, Richard or Hugh Cabot, and Pusey (I think
that is the name of the big dermatologist) and to make the book a com
plete popular encyclopedia of diets, sanitation, preventive medicine, symp
toms of diseases, and the like, with particular attention to the care of
children.

If you like either of these ideas, I give them to you as a birthday
present ... I suppose you must have birthdays, though I have never
caught you in the act.

Yours sincerely,
SL

February 18
Dear Red:

It was good to have even a faint talk with you over the telephone
yesterday. I gather that it is a book in which Pola Negri, the movies and
Gouverneur Morris are all mixed up and that you want to talk in terms
of $5000 advance. That s all right as long as the advance depends on a look
or more information.

The George Sterling idea is fine. I remember his articles in The
Mercury. When your letter came, I reread the one on Bierce, and I have
written to him making a definite proposal to publish such a book with a
$500 advance if he will write it.

The family doctor book by real authorities is worth thinking about,
but I think it should be done by someone more inclined to sell books by

196 ELMER GANTRY

subscription or by house-to-house canvassing. And I have heard of an
other similar enterprise nearly ready for publication which we ought to
see before we get much excited. I shrink a little from the book which is,
after all, a symposium. It is such a job to drive a team of so many horses,
and if the editor and the authors are good, they all ought to be well paid
until the publisher hasn t much left for his labor except his pains and
they re apt to be fairly painful.

We are in the midst of February s worst weather. The soft coal
smoke has added a new word to New York s vocabulary, "smog" smoke
and fog. It s worse than London! Business is good. Monty x and Hal and
everyone are well. Don is coming back next week from a three weeks
holiday by himself in North Carolina. He seems to have had a really good
time. How s your secretary working out; where have you been; and
what s all the news? Dictate a good long letter to me when you have the
chance.

Yours,
Alf

Del Monte Lodge
Pebble Beach, California
Feb. 19
Dear Alf:

The situation about the Pola Negri book is this: I met her here with
her friend Gouverneur Morris (and, incidentally, with Valentino, to
whom she is reputed to be engaged, which seems slightly doubtful).
Morris told me that she had written a book that she really HAD and that
it was not by some press-agent and I got a shot at it. After an examina
tion of it, I rather think it is possible that she did write it certainly it has
none of the earmarks of the press-agent or literary hack. What you would
have in the book is a not disgraceful performance backed up by the
strength of her name. I suppose that Pola is about as well known an inter
national actress as there is, although perhaps her screen fame is not so
great as three or four others. Whether it is waxing or waning is something
I cannot determine. So on the whole while I was distinctly interested in
the book, I certainly did not feel like making a definite offer for it you
may remember that I have an authorization to do that in case of emer
gency. I telephoned you principally to find out whether you would be
willing to make a fair advance with, of course, good royalty, if the book

^Although the possibility was discussed several years before, Montgomery
Belgion joined the staff of Harcourt, Brace in September 1925.

[1926] 197

should prove of interest to you. Morris is going to send the book on Pola s
behalf to Paul Reynolds. 1 1 wish you would call up Reynolds and tell him
of your interest.

Pola herself is really a very lively and agreeable person, and while she
probably thinks a good deal about the well-known sex appeal, she is cer
tainly not the lanquid vampire, but rather lively and good fun.

We are leaving here in three days for Los Angeles, and I hope to find
mail there. Where I shall get mail after that, God only knows.

Ever,
SL

P.S. Why don t Hake and my nephew Freeman 2 go to Europe together
next summer? If Hake and you are for it, I think Freeman and his father
could be made to see the light.

Los Angeles Biltmore
February 24th
DearAlf:

It was good to have your letter of the i8th when I arrived here
yesterday. I think that in my letter from Pebble Beach I covered almost
all the news. There is nothing to add to it except that since then we have
had a fine three-day drive from Pebble Beach through glorious mountains
and valleys, and that we are hovering here for just a couple of days to get
mail and have some laundry done. Tomorrow or next day we are off to
Phoenix and Tucson, via the Imperial Valley.

Grace is going to join me in Tucson on the 6th for two or three
weeks motoring, after which she will return to New York and the kid,
and I shall settle down in Kansas City to start the plan on the book. It will
be terribly nice to have the hike with her to be with her and yet not tied
up to the necessity of going to parties and all the rest of the parade which
is so fatiguing in New York. She is, of course, the most delightful and
amusing companion conceivable for a motor hike and loves the "wide
open spaces" even more than I do.

I say start the plan of the book, but actually the plan is already
formed in my head in a rather complete way. It is now largely a question
of developing the details of which I have already thought. I have been
going to a lot of churches since I first hit Kansas City, including a fair
number out here on the Coast. . . .

Go in and kiss Don, Hal, Monty and Gus on the ear for me. I have

1 New York literary agent.

2 Freeman Lewis, son of Lewis s doctor brother. "Hake" is Hastings Harcourt.

198 ELMER GANTRY

no particular choice as to which ear you select. Tell each of them that I
have enjoyed the good long letters they have planned to write to me and
have never written, and I hope they have enjoyed my equally long replies.

Ever,
SL

February 25
Dear Red:

I just have yours about the Pola Negri book; we also have your tele
gram with the Tucson address; and Grace was in for a visit yesterday
morning with her word of your plans. So I feel quite in touch with you
again. I ll call up Reynolds at once, and we ll see what we shall see about
Pola Negri.

By the law of contraries, I suppose you re having glorious weather
and bright sunshine. Today we re deep in rain and slush, and all the lights
in the office are turned on.

The idea of Hastings and Freeman going abroad together has some
points to it, but Hastings is now pretty well committed to a summer of
arduous and special tutoring on the chance of making college next au
tumn. And when he seems to want to work so hard, I don t feel like
stopping him. Also he went abroad last summer. I d be inclined to wait on
this idea for a couple of years.

Ever yours,
Alf

Santa Rita Hotel
Tucson, Ariz.
March 3
Dear Alf:

Safely in Tucson, which is a hell of a nice town with some intelligent
people. It has been a great motor trip down from Pebble Beach with
plenty of desert and one delightful four hours across in old Mexico with
some real beer. Gracie arrives here the end of this week and we will be
motoring off for three weeks or so before she returns to New York. I
think there is no news except that I feel bully and am thinking constantly
of the book.

Ever,
SL

[1926] 199

March 8
Dear Red:

Glad to have your cheerful letter from Tucson. I wish I could be
with you for a week without taking the God-awful trip from here. This
town has been a mess of slush and fog and dirt for the last month.

I "see by the papers" that Pola is thinking of resting in the arms of
Rudolph with some permanence. I suppose it is the rebound from the
attentions you paid to her.

I ll scratch my head over the matter of the second serial rights of
Mantrap. I don t think we ought to promise them to any one yet.

Ever yours,
Alf

Somewhere in the desert between Douglas, Arizona, and
Lordsburg, New Mex. . . . March 1 6
Dear Alf:

Neither Gracie nor myself has ever had quite so joyous a hike as we
are now enjoying. She arrived in Tucson on March <5, and after we had
loafed about that agreeable university town (to which I had motored
from San Francisco, and where I fired my secretary, a nice boy but too
damned collegian to be efficient yet) for a few days, we hired a motor
caravan for a couple of weeks, and with it we are now proceeding in a
delightfully slow manner on a circular tour which will bring us to Phoe
nix in ten days more. Then we ll drop the caravan, and go on just with
my car toward Santa Fe. Perhaps Gracie will go as far as Kansas City
with me; depends on how long we take on the way, because for once we
are keeping ourselves from going so darn fast that we don t see anything.

We motor by ourselves, in my own car, top down, all day; then at
evening we have waiting for us, in the motor caravan, a perfect dinner
prepared by a Jap who is a real chef; and sleep in the bunks on the side of
the car, outdoors in the soft yet rousing desert air, and wake in the morn
ing, miles from any house, to look across cactus and sagebrush to huge
rock mountains bright in the morning sun. ... On the way we have
crossed the Mexican border at Nogales for a bottle of beer; and we stayed
for two days on a real ranch; and for the first time in fifteen years I was
on horseback and, though naturally I got pretty sore auf der bot, I enor
mously enjoyed it. Great hike! And G and I have never been so serene.

Have you ever been bitten by a rattlesnake? Neither have 1. 1 have a
Winchester carbine, and I m such a dead shot at bottles and tin cans that

200 ELMER GANTRY

when I come into a grocery store, all the groceries vault howling from
the shelves and hide.

Ever,
SL

March 20
Dear Red:

I am very happy over your splendid letter from "Somewhere between
Douglas, Arizona, and Lordsburg, New Mexico." It does sound fine for
you both. Don t hurry away from it the days of rest and outdoors, with
enough to do to keep your fingers busy.

Everything serene here. Travelers orders are coming in encourag
ingly for Mantrap. I think we ll have advance orders for between twenty
and thirty thousand on publication and then be ready for a quick turn
over. I suppose some folks would tell you that advance orders would run
between forty and fifty thousand. They may, but I am sort of getting the
habit of prophesying minimums.

The office is pretty much shot by the flu. Monty is out at our house
recovering, and three or four people are out every day with it. Upstate
is particularly bad. So you re both lucky to be in Arizona. I m going
down to Pinehurst with Hastings today for a week. He is home for his
spring holiday.

Ever yours,
Alf

Hotel Adams
Phoenix, Arizona
March 22
Dear Alf:

We ve finished the circular tour in the motor caravan through South
ern Arizona, very happily, through the most glorious mountain and desert
scenery you could possibly imagine; we drop the caravan here and to
morrow Grace and I start for Santa Fe on our own. Both of us feel suberb.
(That last word seems to be a cross between suburb and superb interpret
it as you will.)

I have read Microbe Hunters at last, and I am quite daft about it.
I have never read finer drama, finer sarcasm, clearer exposition, deeper
perception of human purposes; and those things must be in the writing as
well as in the thought.

I note that the Los Angeles Times is going to publish Arrowsimth,

[1926] 201

second serial, beginning next Sunday. I had forgotten, or I never knew,
that the second serial rights had been sold* How many papers are pub
lishing it, and at what terms?

Til be in Kansas City in about two weeks, and very keen and ready
to start on the preacher book.

Ever,
SL

La Fonda Hotel
Santa Fe, New Mexico
March 29
Dear Alf :

At last we have motored into Santa Fe, the end of our motoring.
According to reports, there is now mud pretty near all the way to Kansas
City, and good ripe juicy mud, through which there would be no fun
motoring, so I am hiring a man to drive my car on to K.C and after a
couple of days here, Grace and I are going on there by train. She will stay
four or five days, then back to New York, I shall get some kind of fur
nished apartment and stay in K.C. at least two months. In a week from
now, I hope to be hard at work on the book, for which I am very keen
and ready. Next summer I may spend in the Middlewest, but wherever I
am, I ll be settled down and at work. I ll probably spend next winter
abroad, but I hope to have the whole first draft of the book complete
before I sail, and revise it over there.

Damn it, the title Sounding Brass is gone. This spring DufEeld s will
publish a book under that title by an English girl named Ethel Mannin,
one that has already run into seven editions in England. I know this be
cause they have written asking me to do a preface for the book (which
same I ain t going to do). So we must have a new title. What do you think
of this? The chief character is going to be named Elmer Bloor, and what
do you think of REV. BLOOR? Actually, I suppose it would be more dis
tinctive than Sounding Brass, with its metaphorical nature.

I m enclosing letter from Russia. I think you might send these people
a set of my books, Hal s biography of me, and one or two of the press
photographs. Charge the set to me, if you d like. And why don t you send
them Carl s Lincoln? How is Paul s book going?

Ever,
SL

202 ELMER GANTRY

March 30
Dear Red:

I am just back from a few days holiday with Hastings and have your
note from Phoenix. What a splendid time you and Grace must have had!
I m really happy about it.

In regard to the second serial rights of ArrowsTmth: We finally made
an arrangement for release early this year with the Reader s Syndicate, an
energetic off-shoot of the McClure crowd, run by R. M. Cleveland and
C. B. Brown. They set off their broadside and exploitation the middle of
January, and we haven t yet had a definite report of sales. You will have
a report by next month.

I have been watching the Pulitzer prize business all winter, and I d
bet about eighty to twenty that Arrowsmith will get the prize this year.
It ought to mean something to Arrcrwyrmthhow much, I don t know. It
certainly will be a great help in getting Mantrap started, as the prize is
announced at the time of the Columbia Commencement, the first week in
June, 1 just when Mantrap is to be published.

Let me know how you organize your life and work in Kansas City.
It s fine to think of you started on another novel.

Ever yours,
Alf

Hotel Ambassador,
Kansas City, Mo.
April 4
Dear Hal:

Gracie and I are safe in Kansas City, after 3200 miles of motoring, on
some 2000 of which she was present. She leaves tonight for NY and to
morrow I shall be settled down in the Ambassador and busy on a definite
plan for the novel. I m going to work for a while with a Unitarian
and generally disillusioned preacher who was for ten years a Methodist
preacher, whom I ll use as cyclopedia for data about church organization
and the like. He will not, however, have anything like the share taken by
Paul in Anowsmth, and it is distinctly understood that he is temporary
assistant in no sense a collaborator. ... I ll probably stay here a couple
of months, then find some reasonably cool and quiet place for work all
summer. I ll doubtless go to Germany for the winter some time in the
autumn, but I hope to have the first draft of the book all done before I
sail. ... It looms up better and better; lots of new dope. Grace may go
to Germany in June; in that case I ll join her, say late in October.
1 -The Pulitzer Prizes are actually announced early in May.

[1926] 20?

The trip has been a great success. I wish you could have been with
me in Arizona day after day of grim mountains, desert but not dead
desert, rather alive with constantly changing flora, cactus, poppies, palo
verde trees, mesquite cedars. Men who combine Western virility with
some tradition of courtesy probably from Virginia. Real cow ranches and
some riding. Funny little pioneer towns, then Tucson with its university
and yearning would-be writers and new houses in the Spanish style,
rather striking. Gorgeous sunsets behind mesas. Waking in the morning
to cool sweet air. Great!

Ever,
Red

Hotel Ambassador
Kansas City
April 4
Confidential:
Dear Alf :

I hope they do award me the Pulitzer prize on Arrowsmith but you
know, don t you, that ever since the Main Street burglary, 1 1 have planned
that if they ever did award it to me, I would refuse it, with a polite but
firm letter which I shall let the press have, and which ought to make it
impossible for any one ever to accept the novel prize (not the play or
history prize) thereafter without acknowledging themselves as willing to
sell out. There are three chief reasons the Main Street and possibly the
Babbitt matters, the fact that a number of publishers advertise Pulitzer
Prize novels not, as the award states, as "best portraying the highest stand
ard of American morals and manners" or whatever it is but as the in
every-way "best novel of the year," and third the whole general matter
of any body arrogating to itself the right to choose a best novel.

Just on the chance that they may give me the award, I wish you
would secure for me, so that I may prepare a proper answer, Robert
Morss Lovett s letter denouncing them giving away their turning down
the "committee of experts" on the matter of Main Street. That letter you
reprinted, as an ad for Main Street, and should have in your files. And can
you get for me the exact wording of the terms of the award that "stand-

1 In 1921 the Pulitzer Prize Committee selected to recommend the award for the
best novel of 1920 consisted of Hamlin Garland, Stuart Sherman, and Robert Morss
Lovett. Their choice was Main Street, but the judges rejected their nomination and
selected Edith Wharton s The Age of Innocence. A lively dispute in the press fol
lowed the announcement, and the Committee finally published their recommenda
tions for the sake of the record.

204 ELMER GANTRY

ard of manners and morals" stuff? If you ll be so good as to send me these
two before long, I ll be ready for them.

You ask how I m going to organize my work here. Grace leaves for
NY tonight, and tomorrow I move into the Hotel above; a most agreeable
small furnished apartment with two bedrooms, one of which, mit beds
removed, I turn into work-room, a living room, and kitchen-dining-room.
I shall have a cook of my own, but also have hotel service to fall back on.
A highy disillusioned and amiable Unitarian preacher here, who was a
Methodist preacher, both in city and country (for a time an assistant to
Chris Reisner, who is now building the skyscraper church in NY), will
work with me in the matter of facts, of exact data. I already have the
story so well organized in my mind that I hope to have the whole plan
done in a month, and be into the actual writing. Next summer I ll spend
in some such place as a cottage on some Minnesota lake. Probably I ll go
abroad, joining Grace there, in the fall, but by then I hope to have the
whole first draft complete.

Besides this Unitarian, I ll have at least thirty other preachers to
whom to turn for information andthough Gawd how I dread it I shall
attend various churches with frequency. . . . Hence I d better beat it
now, and go to Easter service, this gray and snowy and generally joyous
Easter morn!

Ever,
SL

April 5
Dear Red:

I am glad to have your letter and the telegram giving your permanent
Kansas City address. I hope to see Grace soon after she returns to New
York and hear about you and your trip in more detail.

We have sent a copy of Microbe Hunters to Fred Howe. Paul has
just shown me your letter to him about the book. He is immensely grati
fied to have you write to him so warmly about it. The book is doing well
it has sold a little over 5000 already and is making its way to a good
sale. And then, of course, it has all sorts of chances for special sales to
reading circles and Chautauquas, and we are seeing what we can do to
have it made required reading in introductory courses in bacteriology.

I am not absolutely happy about Reverend Bloor as a title. How
would the two words The Reverend do? Throughout small-town Amer
ica, that is the general term used in referring to the local minister and

[1926] 205

stands for ministers somewhat in the same way that Main Street stands for
the small town.

It s fine to know you re really started to work again.

Ever yours,
Atf

April 7
Dear Red:

I have yours of April fourth about the Pulitzer Prize, etc. It led me
to go digging back to the old box of clippings, and I certainly did get a
kick out of the recreation of those most interesting days. I enclose a copy
of the advertisement in which we reproduced Lovett s letter giving the
exact phrase about "the wholesome atmosphere of American life, etc."
Your decision in regard to the matter is wise and fine, I only hope it turns
out so that the affair can be handled with just the right gesture. It would
be a little awkward, for instance, if they should send you an advance
announcement and ask if you would accept.

All that you say about the organization of your work on the new
novel is mighty promising. Your letters have the old-time ring, and I am
glad for you and for the book. I hope your Easter eggs and lilies and
hallelujahs set well.

Ever yours,
Alf

In March Lewis refused an offer from Haldeman-Julius of a small outright
fee for the publication of his short stories in the Little Blue Book series.
This resulted in an exchange of correspondence <with Haldeman-Julius
that brought about the offer of a small royalty. But since the idea of the
publication by Harcourt, Brace of a volume of his short stories had come
up from time to time, Lews decided against accepting,

Kansas City, April 8
Dear Alf:

If this damned preacher book takes me long enough we may possibly
want to publish a volume of my short stories between it and Mantrap and
so I think it would be much better, particularly as there is almost no
money in it (And God knows no glory) to tell Haldeman-Julius that we
are not yet ready to close with him, and if he comes back with a snotty
letter tell him to go to hell.

I know what you mean about the soundness of The Reverend as a

206 ELMER GANTRY

title but there are two things against it: It might seem rather flippant and
prepare the reader for a cheaply humorous book; and in England and on
the continent it would have none of the connotation it would carry in
this country. Fortunately, there is no hurry about the decision on this.
I wish you would have the two titles The Reverend and Rev. Bloor typed
out (and you might add to it a third conceivable candidate The Salesman
o-f Salvation) and show them to Gus Gehrs, the Baker & Taylor people,
and some good high-brow like Stuart Sherman and see what they think.
I think you will find that in the long run you will like Rev. Bloor better
and better as it becomes more distinctive in your mind, just as we all liked
Babbitt better and better as it became more familiar to us.

I have heard from a source quite dissociated from you your hunch
that I am to receive the Pulitzer Novel Prize and so I am waiting the
more eagerly for the dope which I asked you to send me. I hope you will
not think that my decision in this matter is altogether insane. Certainly it
is not too hasty a one; I have been thinking it over any number of times
during the last five or six years, though I never could believe that they
really would give me the prize.

Gawd, the new novel goes swell. I have a perfect corker to assist me
on it the Reverend Dr. Birkhead, of whom I wrote you. He is giving me
exactly the dope I need. Twenty new scenes appear every hour and at the
present moment I feel fairly sure it is going to be much the biggest and
much the most dramatic thing I have done.

May God help you in your prayerful efforts, brother, and any time
you need the help of the clergy call on me and I will see to it that your
petition ascends to the throne of God ahead of those of Alfred Knopf,
Horace Liveright or Calvin Coolidge.

Ever,
SL

April 14
Dear Red:

I m tremendously glad to hear from you directly, though it s extraor
dinary how little I have been actually out of touch with where you are
and what you ve been doing. Even in a desert you have the faculty of
bumping into a lot of people who apparently rush to the nearest wireless
station, tell the world how you look, what you said, and how many glasses
of beer you just had.

I don t know what Kansas City is like as a dwelling place, but I dare
say you can stand it if anybody can; and since you have been surrounded

[1926] 207

by the Middlewest and the Rev. Bill Stidger, I don t see why it isn t as
good a place to turn out the novel as anywhere else.

I haven t seen Grace yet, but I met someone who saw somebody else
who saw her on the Avenue, and she appears at third-hand to be in very
good form. We re getting all primed for Mantrap around here.

Very hastily,
Hal

April 14
Dear Red:

We have cogitated over the title. Rev. Bloor doesn t quite suit us.
It sounds a little too satirical. We want all the church people who take
their preachers seriously to read the novel. Perhaps there is a clue to the
title in what we have all fallen into the habit of calling the book "the
preacher novel." Why not call it The Preacher? I do not like The Sales
man of Salvation, nor does anyone else here. Perhaps a name would be all
right if it were not Bloor. The right tide will come between now and
next fall.

How do you intend to handle the question of serialization of this
book? If you want me to handle it, I ll be glad to, though you can do it
just as well yourself. However, I think it would be better not to get a
board of editors buzzing around you until the book is done.

Ever yours,
Atf

Kansas City, April 2 1
Dear Alf :

About the serialization I should seriously doubt if there will be any
serialization at all. In any case, you are quite right in saying that if there
is to be, it would be asinine to let the editors even talk about it before the
book is finished.

About the title: just at present I am thinking rather affectionately of:
THE REVEREND DOCTOR. But it is really much too early to worry about the
title at all.

Everything about the book is going superbly and we are getting fine
new dramatic scenes every day. All of this damned fool preaching in
pulpits and so on which I have been doing has been largely to give me a
real feeling of the church from the inside. 1

1 On one of these occasions while he was addressing a congregation, Lewis defied
God to strike him dead and held a watch in his hand for ten minutes.

208 ELMER GANTRY

No, I am not satisfied either with The Preacher or The Reverend.
I agree with you in cutting out The Salesman of Salvation.

Ever,
SL

April 23
Dear Red:

I am sorry to have to inform you that the frequent and delightful
exchange of letters between us that has done so much to make a long
winter endurable will have to be interrupted because I am sailing tonight
on the Majestic to spend about three weeks at 10 Bury Street. I don t
know whether you realize that you have been in England every time I
have been there so far, and I expect I shall be thinking of you there per
haps even more often than I do here, which is oftener than you think
from my letters. I see you re being mentioned frequently in the news
papers these days.

With all my blessings,

Yours,
Don

April 23
Dear Red:

I saw in the paper that the Pulitzer Prize organization met at Colum
bia University yesterday, and this morning I notice that the office is for
warding to you "a personal and confidential" communication from the
secretary of the University.

I just have your letter of the 2ist. What you say about your doubts
of serializing the preacher novel warms my heart. If you can afford it
when the time comes, it may be just the thing to forego. I like The
Reverend Doctor as a tide.

Your preaching business has stirred this part of the country. I enclose
a couple of typical clippings and a letter. It is extraordinary the number
of letters and telephone calls we have had about it. Luck and love!

Yours,
Alf

Kansas City, April 24
Dear Hal:

I have been delighted to receive your weekly letter in the spirit and
almost overwhelmed with astonishment to receive one of them in black

[1926] 209

and white. I am getting into the preacher book with both feet and it looks
excellent.

I am going to spend the summer somewhere in the Middle West
working on the preacher book and then join Gracie in Germany in the
fall. I expect to have a cottage, and a reasonably comfortable one, on some
lake in Northern Minnesota or Wisconsin. Why don t yon get away from
your damned ocean for a while and come out and join me?

Ever,
Red

Kansas City, April 26
Personal and Confidential
Dear Alf :

Well, doggone it, it s happened Fve got the Pulitzer Prize, and I ve
been spending about as much time in refusing this thousand dollars as
ordinarily I d spend in earning it.

The following is the letter received yesterday afternoon:

April 23, 1926
My dear Mr. Lewis

I take very great pleasure in notifying you, in confidence, that the prize of
$1000, established by the will of the late Joseph Pulitzer for the best American
novel published during the year 1925 has been awarded to Arrowsmith, pub
lished by Harcourt, Brace and Co.

Public announcement of this prize will not be made until Monday, May
3rd, and in due course a check covering the amount of the prize will be sent
to you.

Very truly yours
Frank D. Fackenthal

So. This gives us plenty of time. Go over with the greatest care the draft
of my letter of refusal which I am enclosing. You have asked me to write
them lightly but my God, you can t refuse a thing like this without giving
reasons and without having in that refusal a document which stands on its
own feet, completely self-explanatory. But I have tried to make it as un-
flamboyant and as short as I could while including everything necessary,
I m meekly (well so so) willing to hear any criticisms. ... I think you
might have Don look it over and, still more, JES both because of Jes s
literary attainments and because of his hatred of the machine at which I
want to hit. Do have him! Then I ll send it to them after May 5th. Perhaps
you d better wire me what changes Spingarn and Don and you think 3 d
better be made in the letter.

An asinine, fantastic, useless, expensive gesture, refusing this prize.

210 ELMER GANTRY

But ... I can do no other. By the way, of course $250 of the prize
would be coming to Paul, and if he wants, I ll pay him that rite now, or
you are authorized to do so for me. I can t write to Paul himself; there
has been no friendliness in his letters, no interest, and I m through with
the vain task of trying to pump it up. But he has every right to the quarter
which I am thus arbitrarily refusing for him. Tell him so, when you see
him.

You probably realize that most or all of this idiotic appearing in
pulpits and general ecclesiastical hell-raising is to have the chance to be
behind the scenes, completely in, with church matters, and it has worked
like a charm. I have a Sunday School class of 1 5 preachers who meet for
lunch every Wednesday noon and whom I razz amiably . . . and who
like me. The definite plan is going down, fast, and all looks well. . . .
Then lakeside quiet, and the book itself.

Let me know, P.D.Q., by wire or letter, what you think of my letter,
and wht plans for issuing same to great heart of genl public.

Ever
SL

I imcst have in that Natl Inst Arts Letters stuff to make a complete case.
They never let the news of my refusal out. I was too polite!

You remember, don t you, that "I can do no other" was Luther s
justification.

April 29
Dear Red:

Joel and I have just had lunch over the Pulitzer Prize business, and
we have gone over your statement with eagle eyes. Did you notice that
the formal letter to you contained the phrase "for the best American
novel" which is quite different from the actual wording of the prize con
ditions. Joel recalled a circumstance to my memory which I had forgot
ten. Since the Main Street affair, the committee recommended George
Kelly s play The Show-Off for the Prize. Brander Matthews saw Pres
ident Butler and had the Prize awarded to Hatcher Hughes s Hell Bent
for Heaven -which is another instance of the dubious administration.

It would be even better if the press carried the announcement that
you had won the Prize for a day or two, and then the announcement of
your refusal. I think the Associated Press would prefer to carry it on the
Kansas City date line, and I suggest that you hand your statement to their
Kansas Qty correspondent. In the meantime, send me a copy in its final
form, and I ll telegraph you when I have received it, so that at the same

[1926] 211

time you hand it to the Kansas City man I can take it to a friend of mine
in the Associated Press upstairs.

Now as to the statement. It is not quite serious and dignified enough
in tone. You re taking your proper position as the champion of the artist.
You are not attacking the Y.M.C.A. or the taste of suburban dinner-tables
they may really be sympathetic to your point of view. What you re
doing are three things: objecting to the standard set up in the Foundation;
objecting to the misrepresentation of the standard; objecting to the du
bious administration of the awards. And fourth, you re objecting to liter
ary prizes and academies in general.

I think you might make a little more of the administration of the
award. "Changing prize committee" is a loose phrase. The committee
which recommends a book for the Prize is one thing: they are the people
who recommended Main Street, for instance. The actual awarders of the
Prize are the people to whom you refer by the words "imperial power."
This should be cleaned up a little.

I would be definite and say that you declined election to the Institute
of Arts and Letters some years ago, as this shows the consistent policy on
your part.

The last sentence of the statement is a little gooey, and I don t know
whether it is so damned "innocently" or not. I have pencilled in an idea
for a concluding phrase, on which you might easily improve.

That s that. Congratulations and best wishes! I have had more fun
over this since your letter arrived yesterday afternoon than anything else
in a long while.

Ever yours,
Alf

Kansas City, Sunday, May 2
Dear Alf:

I have gone over all your comments with care and have, I think,
accepted all your changes, besides making quite a few on my own behalf.
The present form of the statement seems to be pretty compact.

I am enclosing two copies, one for yourself, one for the A.P. My
many thanks for your labors on this. Joel has sent me a fine telegram
which I much appreciate. Thank him for me if you see him.

The book tramps right on. I couldn t have a better man than Birkhead
to give me dope. Personally most charming as well as most learned, young
enough to be comradely, he has had ten years as a Methodist preacher,
ten as a Unitarian, both observantly; and though he doesn t even smoke,
he enjoys language of the type made holy by Paul and Spike and myself.

212 ELMER GANTRY

I ll be here two more weeks; then a week s interregnum while I motor
to Minnesota and look over cottages; then settled down again for at least
three months.

Ever,
SL

PS Have you taken up with Paul the question of the $250 which this
causes me to owe him? Let me know details of what writers and pub
lishers say privately about my Pulitzer Prize insanity. Lots of them will
just call it publicity-hounding. The previous prize winners will probably
all be sore especially Booth Tarkington, who has twice accepted it (and
for one bum novel, along with one good one).

This summer would be your inspired chance for Ellen, Hake & you
to ship car by boat to Chicago or Duluth. Come see me for a few days,
then motor to Yellowstone Park or farther, & let Hake & some friend
drive back.

Letter to the Pulitzer Prize Committee which was enclosed in
Lewis s letter of the second and which was later given to the
Associated Press:

Sirs:

I wish to acknowledge your choice of my novel Arrowsmith for the
Pulitzer Prize. That prize I must refuse, and my refusal would be mean
ingless unless I explained the reasons.

All prizes, like all titles, are dangerous. The seekers for prizes tend to
labor not for inherent excellence but for alien rewards; they tend to write
this, or timorously to avoid writing that, in order to tickle the prejudices
of a haphazard committee. And the Pulitzer Prize for Novels is peculiarly
objectionable because the terms of it have been constantly and grievously
misrepresented.

Those terms are that the prize shall be given "for the American novel
published during the year which shall best present the wholesome atmos
phere of American life, and the highest standard of American manners
and manhood." This phrase, if it means anything whatever, would appear
to mean that the appraisal of the novels shall be made. not according to
their actual literary merit but in obedience to whatever code of Good
Form may chance to be popular at the moment.

That there is such a limitation of the award is little understood.
Because of the condensed manner in which the announcement is usually
reported, and because certain publishers have trumpeted that any novel
which has received the Pulitzer Prize has thus been established without

[1926] 213

qualification as the best novel, the public has come to believe that the prize
is the highest honor which an American novelist can receive.

The Pulitzer Prize for Novels signifies, already, much more than a
convenient thousand dollars to be accepted even by such writers as smile
secretly at the actual wording of the terms. It is tending to become a
sanctified tradition. There is a general belief that the administrators of the
prize are a pontifical body with the discernment and the power to grant
the prize as the ultimate proof of merit. It is believed that they are always
guided by a committee of responsible critics, though in the case both of
this and other Pulitzer Prizes, the administrators can, and sometimes do,
quite arbitrarily reject the recommendations of their supposed advisers.

If already the Pulitzer Prize is so important, it is not absurd to suggest
that in another generation it may, with the actual terms of the award
ignored, become the one thing for which any ambitious novelist will
strive; and the administrators of the prize may become a supreme court,
a college of cardinals, so rooted and so sacred that to challenge them will
be to commit blasphemy. Such is the French Academy, and we have had
the spectacle of even an Anatole France intriguing for election.

Only by regularly refusing the Pulitzer Prize can novelists keep such
a power from being permanently set up over them.

Between the Pulitzer Prizes, the American Academy of Arts and
Letters and its training-school the National Institute of Arts and Letters,
amateur boards of censorship, and the inquisition of earnest literary ladies,
every compulsion is put upon writers to become safe, polite, obedient,
and sterile. In protest, I declined election to the National Institute of Arts
and Letters some years ago, and now I must decline the Pulitzer Prize.

I invite other writers to consider the fact that by accepting the prizes
and approval of these vague institutions, we are admitting their authority,
publicly confirming them as the final judges of literary excellence, and
I inquire whether any prize is worth that subservience.

I am, sirs,

Yours sincerely,
Sinclair Lewis

May 4
Dear Red:

It is late because we have been standing on our heads to do a prompt
and careful job on your statement. You have done a perfect job and I am
proud of you.

The Associated Press here will distribute it tomorrow for release in
the papers Thursday morning. They did not want it given to the AJP. in

214 ELMER GANTRY

Kansas Qty, as that might cause confusion. They have promised to send
it complete to the New York, Boston and Chicago press. And they may
send it complete to the entire country; they cannot promise that because
of the British strike. We are sending out a thousand copies by mail, with
the following statement:

The Associated Press is distributing the enclosed letter for release Thurs
day A.M., May sixth. It is desirable that you have the complete text herewith.

In addition to the press, we are sending this to the Publishers Weekly, the
weeklies and monthlies, our list of booksellers and clerks, and to a careful
list of about a hundred authors, such as Dreiser, Sandburg, Anderson,
Gather, Mencken, etc. I went over the "best-selling" list for three years,
and a list of best novels to catch all the most important names from Upton
Sinclair to Hendrik Van Loon and from Ellen Glasgow to Edith Wharton.
I am also sending the letter to the editors of such journals as the Christian
Science Monitor. So I guess we have done a complete job. Tomorrow I
shall send some to people in England who would be interested, including
Don.

Macy s have just telephoned for a hundred Arro*wsmith. I think the
reaction will be splendid. Laurence Stallings came in yesterday morning
and said, "Wouldn t it be splendid if Lewis would refuse the Pulitzer
prize!" And I had all I could do to keep my mouth shut. That s all tonight.
Fine business! Now sit tight and don t say a word.

Yours,
Alf

May 5
Dear Red:

Well, you certainly got a run for your money on the news of your
refusal of the Pulitzer Prize. The Associated Press office is on the floor
above us, and we have become acquainted with some of the people there.
I discussed the policy of its release with them on a friendly basis. They
promised complete distribution if they could handle it here. They carried
the letter in full, as you will see by the enclosed sheets, which comprise a
summary story released at 4:01 P.M., followed by the complete letter at
4:07, Pulitzer s comment at 7:35, and a day story for today sent at 1:45
A.M. I think I d like to have you return these to me to stick in my first
edition copy of Arrowsmith.

I have had the office send you clippings from the New York press.
The World, Times, and Tribune made a first page story of it; in fact,

[1926] 215

your picture illustrating the story was the only one on the first page of
the Tribune this morning.

The A.P. said the only thing that could interfere would be news of a
revolution in England x or some such matter, which might swamp thek
facilities. To insure against this, I mailed a copy of your statement in full,
special delivery, to the important papers in Boston, Philadelphia, Chicago,
and New York.

I am glad you are going up to Minnesota for three months work.
I think it will be better for the book if the first draft gets done in this
country.

It has been a beautiful job, Red. I m proud to have had something to
do with it.

Ever yours,
Alf

Kansas City, May 7
Dear Alf:

I have had so many corking letters from you in the last few days that
to answer them in detail would take a month and so I shall reserve all of
that energy for my loving little volume about the preachers and merely
say that I am extremely grateful to you for the hundred things that you
have done for me in this Pulitzer business and damn glad that you like the
letter to the Pulitzer prize committee in its final form. I am sending some
of the telegrams which I have received to Gracie and she will sooner or
later show them to you. I cannot imagine a more thorough job than you
are doing in sending out the complete copy of the letter to publications
and authors. I am carefully avoiding making any comments on the com
ments which are wired from New York here and I more or less have the
newspaper men working with me on this to keep fool wisecracks out of
the press.

Ever,
SL

May 10

Dear Red:

I don t suppose there will be any more significant comment on the
refusal until the weeklies and monthlies come along. I won t send on any
more clippings unless something significant appears. In the first place,
you ve done a good job and might as well throw it over your shoulder;

1 The general strike in England had aroused apprehensions.

216 ELMER GANTRY

in the second place, with Don in England and Gus at the St. Louis Con
vention, I m very busy. Incidentally, business is good. It looks as if our
sales would run over a million dollars this year.

Ever yours,
Alf

Kansas City, May 1 1
Dear Alf:

I am returning the Associated Press story herewith, and sending you
a hell of a lot of stray letters which have come in from odds and ends of
people. All these letters have been answered. When you are through with
them, I wish you would send them up to Gracie and tell her to chuck
them into the basket when she has looked them over. Tell her that if she
sends them back to me I will make a special trip to New York to fight her.

I think you handled the whole business magnificently, and apparently
there has been no confusion except in the delayed receipt of my letter by
the Prize Committee. There came pretty near being a bad break here in
the Star s getting the story too early, but a reporter risked his job by hold
ing the story out on them for several hours so that they would not spring
it too early. I must remember this incident whenever I get sore at the
reporters for doing too much blabbing.

As I shall be leaving here next Monday, you will get this letter just
about in time to make a change in my address. Until I wire you my sum
mer address in northern Minnesota, please send my mail care of Dr. E. J.
Lewis, Sauk Centre, Minn.

I am not going to send you these two letters x (of which copies are
enclosed) but I think you will be glad to see the copies and know that
my brothers in the church are sticking by their bishop when he is under
fire by the sinful of the world.

Sincerely yours,
Sinclair Lewis

P.S. The enclosed picture may amuse you. I don t know whether or not
I have told you anything about my Sunday School class. I have had from
fifteen to twenty preachers coming to lunch with me every Wednesday,
and I have had rather remarkable luck in asking them impertinent ques
tions about why they are ministers. This is a photograph of one of the
smaller meetings of the class taken out on the roof of the Ambassador,
and in the picture No. i is Dr. Hanson, Methodist preacher and head of
the Methodist Book Concern here in Kansas City. No. 2 is Bill Stidger of

1 Congratulatory letters from Henry Mencken and George Jean Nathan.

[1926] 217

whom you have already heard a great deal 3 and 4 are Shively and Ruth
erford, both Christian (Campbellite) preachers. No. 5 is Birkhead, the
Unitarian, who is working with me on the book and who will spend all
summer with me in the north, accompanied by his wife and boy (as Mrs.
Birkhead is taking this dictation I cannot tell you what a low hound this
preacher is, so I will have to confide that to you later). If you do take
my dare and motor through Minnesota and westward this summer, as I
hope to God you will, you will meet the Birkheads and find what a pious,
pure, noble unblasphemous soul the Reverend father is. (Let me again
remind you that as I am dictating this to Mrs. B. I don t mean any of these
things, but will explain them in private later.)

No. 6 is Roberts, who is a completely modernist preacher of the John
Haynes Holmes type. No. 7 is J. C. Maupin-you may remember reading
in the paper about his successfully running for mayor as a modernist in
Clarence, Mo. He is an ex-Baptist preacher who saved his soul by chuck
ing the whole damn thing. 8 and 9 are a couple of laymen who were in as
guests. 10 is Rabbi Mayer, the most important Jewish preacher in town.
1 1 is Burris Jenkins, who is, perhaps, the best known preacher in town, or
indeed in all this section of the world. He is a Campbellite and it was in
his pulpit that I spoke up to papa God. 1 3 is Clarence Reidenbach, a Con-
gregationalist preacher, who is the president of the Ministerial Alliance
here. 14 is the Rev. Earl Blackman, Burris Jenkins assistant, former na
tional chaplain of the American Legion, and one of the nicest fellows I
ever met in my life. He is going to drive to northern Minnesota with me
just for the trip.

No. 1 5 is Sam Harkness, Presbyterian preacher. He is coming to New
York, by the way, in a few days, and I have given him a joint letter of
introduction to you, Hal and Monty. He is a devil of a nice fellow per
sonally I think you will like him very much indeed, and he will be able
to tell you at first hand all about the Sunday School class, about my con
tact with the preachers in Kansas City, and about my prospects for doing
a really good book on the ministry. As to No. 12, that is the Right
Reverend Bishop Doctor Lewis, the teacher of the class.

(Some P.S. says Mrs. Birkhead.)

May 17
Dear Red:

Thanks for your note and the further letters. The picture of your
Sunday school class is fine.

It doesn t appear possible for us to get out to the coast this summer.
Ellen and I may get to Chicago on a semi-business trip and might run out

218 ELMER GANTRY

to sec you from there. But even that is doubtful. Hastings is going to a
summer school in Maine to polish off some college entrance points, and
I am looking forward to hanging around here except for short holidays,

Ever yours,
Alf

There was only one more brief letter from Lewis from Kansas City
written on the eve of his departure and concerned with minor matters.
No further word was received -from him until his letter of May 2$th.

Star Route #2,
Pequot, Minn.
May 29
Dear Alf:

There s my address for the summer. It s not a luxurious cottage, but
comfortable, and its charm is its location. It s amid a hundred acres of my
own (temporarily) land, with a mile of shore front, fine sandy beach of
Lake Pelican, so that Fll be absolutely secluded for work. Yet the roads
are fine, and only five miles away is the best summer hotel in Minnesota,
so that I can have a dance or a good dinner when I get sick of solitude.
MIT fine swimming, fishing, tramping through largely unspoiled woods.

I m writing from Sauk Centre, but I ll leave here about next Wednes
day, and be on the job about Thursday, really hard at work, for the plan
is all done and I m ready to start the book itself.

Fine hike from Chicago here and north and back again, and I m keen
as mustard.

Ever,
SL

June i
Dear Red:

It s good to have your address for the summer. We are publishing a
novel entitled Mantrap the day after tomorrow. The advance orders will
be between twenty-five and thirty thousand. The orders are best where
the buyers have read the book. Even your old friendly enemy, Doc
Wells x of the Powers Mercantile Company, Minneapolis, writes me an
enthusiastic letter about it. You must know there is nothing that is more
fun around this office than to publish a novel by S.L.

Ever yours,
Alf

1 Leonard S. Wells, buyer for the book department, Powers Mercantile Company.

[1926] 219

Pequot, Minn.
June 9
DearAlf:

I have changed the name Elmer Bloor to MYRON MELLISH. Among
the other objections to Bloor was one you more or less hinted at it is so
ugly, so scornful, that it prejudices the reader too early. I tried out Elmer
Mellish, but the El-muh-mel assonance is bad. Myron has just the same
color as Elmer, and Fm fairly well satisfied with the name now. I can see it
in church notices, "The Rev. Dr. Myron Mellish will preach "

Among other virtues of Mellish is: so far as I know, no one has that
actual name its made up from Melhuish. Now as Mellish is so much less
objectionable, so much less indicative than Bloor, you may have less ob
jection to the title The Rev. Dr. Mellish. But I d be perfectly content
with any of these three: THE REV. DR. MELLISH REVEREND MELLISH
THE REVEREND DOCTOR. As I told you, my only point for holding out for
the name in the title in this sulky way is that having the name of the man
in the title makes people remember it so much better it identifies the man
and the book. For the present I m going to call the book The Reverend
Doctor, but will you please brood on all three from time to time.

All settled, and the book actually started. And tell Monty my invita
tion is opener than ever.

Ever,
SL

Doesn t this sound like M. St.-Babbitt days? The fussing that gets some
where?

June 12
Dear Red:

The way Mantrap is getting along is fairly summed up in the two
clippings enclosed. Broun, as you can see, likes it; the Brooklyn Eagle
doesn t like it and reports it is the best selling novel in Brooklyn.

Myron Mellish is better than Elmer Bloor. Of the tides you give,
both Monty and I like The Reverend Doctor best at first blush. But
Monty is the only one I have had time to show the letter to yet. Myron
Mellish might not be a bad tide.

It s fine to think of you at work by a nice lake.

Ever yours,
Alf

220 ELMER GANTRY

Pequot, Minn.
June 12
Dear Dr. Harcourt:

No, Myron Mellish is not right. Besides, proves there was or is a
well-known Episcopalian preacher, Howard Mellish. The name now is
and I hope will continue to be-ELMER GANTRY. Say it aloud. See if you
don t like the sharp sound of the Gantry.

Ever,
SL

June 15
Dear Red:

Mellish was and Mellish is a rather "ishy" name. Gantry has a better
bite.

Ever yours,
Alf

June 24
Dear Red:

The news about Mantrap is so-so a steady sale but no walk-away.
Publication date was the third of June, and we have actually shipped out
a little over 30,000 copies. This is good but not wonderful.

I hope the place and the book and everything go well with you.

Ever yours,
Alf

Only brief business notes were received from Lews in this period when
he was starting to write Elmer Gantry. While he was in Pequot, Minne
sota, Mrs. Lewis sailed on the Mauretania June $th for Paris.

Pequot, Minn.
July 22
Dear Alf:

Everything goes on well and steadily, and the Reverend Dr. Gantry
progresses in holiness. Gracie seems to be having a quiet but very happy
time in Austria after a good stay in Switzerland.

I don t know what my plans will be after I leave here, but I am
pretty sure that the novel will take me five or six more months, and I am

[1926] 221

hesitating about going abroad before finishing it. I may possibly get a
house in Washington for part or all of the winter.

Ever,
SL

Pequot, Minn.

August i
Dear Don:

^ Thank you very much for letting me see the interesting English
reviews of Mantrap, which I am returning. You have noticed the Atlantic
Monthly review, haven t you? One of the best. Do you start advertising
the book again soon? I ve seen no advertising of it of late. I don t, of
course, expect anything extravagant if the thing won t go over, but hasn t
it a chance as a fall book?

I imagine the preacher book will have a chance to rival Main St and
Babbitt. It s going on steadily, and looks good to me. I d hoped to have it
done by October first, but if 11 be nearer January ist; also I d hoped to go
abroad this fall but just now I don t want to leave the country till I have
it all done and the galleys read. So when I leave here, some time in Sep
tember, I ll probably go to Washington for part or all of the winter; and
I m waiting to hear from Gracie whether she d rather stay abroad, and
have me join her as soon as the work is done, or come back in September
and join me in Washington.
Affectionate regards to all.

Ever,
Red

August 7
Dear Red:

I am just back at the office from a fortnight wandering around New
England with Ellen in the car. We had a fine holiday. Don has shown me
your letter of August first and the English reviews of Mantrap. They are
first-rate, aren t they? Hal has just started on vacation, and I can t con
veniently lay my hands on proofs of recent advertisements. I know he
has been using an ad made up of these British reviews pretty generally.

What you say about the preacher book sounds fine. I too believe it
will have a real chance of rivalling Main Street and Babbitt, and that it
will take you to more nearly January first than October first to finish it
is probably a sign in that direction. I should think Washington would be

222 ELMER GANTRY

a good place to finish it. I hope you have been well and that the work
hasn t taken too much out of you. Still, I guess that you live more on and
for writing a good novel than anything else. It s not such a bad reason for
existence or work, either. I am getting endlessly curious to see part of it
and hear about the story. When you switch to Washington, I can prob
ably have a chance either here or there.

Ever yours,
Alf

In the weeks following his letter of August first, there was no word -from
Lewis while he continued to work on Elmer Gantry. The office wrote
him news of the sale of Mantrap.

August Twenty-sixth
Dear Red:

We are having mysterious letters and cables about a three-act play of
yours called City Hall. Have you been concealing something in the folds
of your robe? These rumors have all come from Germany and we have
seen none of the original reports in German papers. Be sure to return
these enclosures.

We had a cable "Hold mail" from Grace last week. Does this mean
that she s coming back and that you have planned to settle down in Wash
ington to finish the novel? How is it and how are you?

Yours,
Alf

Pequot, Minn.
August no it ain t

September 3
Dear Alf:

The enclosures refer to the play which Phil Goodman and I tried to
write in Munich and Paris, and which was a fluke-never got beyond the
first act. No such play is in existence nor likely to be, and you might tell
Wolff if he hears of anybody trying to publish a play purporting to be
mine, to stop it by injunction and let us know.

Yes, Gracie is sailing on the Arabic, due in NY the mh, 13*, or
i4th, and I expect to meet her. I ll leave here tomorrow, spend a day in
Minneapolis, a couple in Chicago, and be in NY some time the end of
next week. See you then! I feel fine and ready for a good winter s work.
The first draft of the ms is something more than half done and tastes good.

[1926]

Yes, we expect to have a place in Washington for the winter, with maybe
a Bermuda or Cuba trip when the book and proofs are done.

Ever,
SL

Lewis arrived in New York September w and remained the rest of the
month. In October he went to Washington where he and Mrs. Lewis had
rented a house at 3028 Que Street, N.W.

T\ T> j October 7

Dear Red:

We are beginning to fuss with the jacket and to start a whisper about
Elmer Gantry, so it s time to ask you for help in writing a description of
the new novel. Will you try your hand at the two or three hundred words
you would like to have the booksellers and the critics read about it?

I hope Washington is working out well and that you are feeling- fine
and working like hell.

Ever yours,
Alf

3028 Que Street, N.W.
Washington, D.C.

October 8
Dear Alf :

I m enclosing, as you requested, my biennial burst of hurt modesty
about an opus of the celebrated S.L. Yes, Washington is working out
beautifully; the house is charming, and I m hard ,at work, with an office
up on the ninth floor of the Hotel Lafayette. Our best!

Ever,
SL

Brief letters continued to be exchanged about ne<w photographs of Lewis,
a deposit to his account, etc.

October Twenty-first
Dear Red: J

And how is Washington agreeing with you? I understand that you
and Grace have gotten a house and that you are installed near the top of a
hotel I can imagine the devil peering in your window and rubbing his
wings together in the most self-satisfactory way. You are, my dear fellow,
with this book of yours, his most important advocate in America. I do

224 ELMER GANTRY

not think that it is possible to exaggerate the love which his Sulphurous
Majesty holds for you. If we can sell a few hundred thousand copies of
Elmer (which is the most delightfully innocent name in the world) we
can probably together increase his kingdom and later on the population
of the nether world by vast numbers of the faithful.

All of the above, including my solicitude for your health, is a prelude
to the jacket of your book. I saw this design, with two strong bars, black
and red (which are, incidentally, the devil s colors) on a foreign poster.
Stand off a quarter of a mile and look at it, and I think you ll see why it
is good. It really makes a powerful jacket. Alf likes it and so do I. If you
agree, we ll go ahead with it.

I was sorry not to be able to see you again before you left, but I
couldn t help it. There seem to be so many people on my neck these days
that it is difficult to be free for more than a few odd minutes. But any
how, sometime this fall I want to get down to see you over some week
end, if you re agreeable. As I have explained to you before, your ways as
the most important novelist in the U.S.A., etc., etc. are not my ways. But
that isn t any reason why a friendship that has lasted ten years or more
should peter out.

Yours,
Hal

Washington, Oct. 22
Dear Hal:

I think the Elmer Gantry jacket design s fine, corking. Yes, I m more
than comfortably settled here; and YES, we d both be genuinely delighted
if you could come down for some weekendwhenever you canwe have
lots of room and plenty servants. I have a secluded and quiet room, with
splendid light and air and lots of space, and I m simply working like the
devil, I ll have the book done (be sure to tell Alf this) by the first of
January all right.

Ever,
Red

Washington, Oct. 28
Dear Alf:

Seems to me the jacket of Elmer ought to carry prominently-and the
first ads ought to carrysomething to this effect: "No word of this novel
has ever been published before serially or otherwise." And, for the first
ads, how about something on this order:

[1926] 225

Somehow, the whole country has learned that Sinclair Lewis, after a year spent
entirely with ministers of every sort, has been writing a novel about preachers.
This is itl Elmer Gantry.

^ Corking weather for work, just cool enough, and a perfect place for
it-neither the country and lake, tempting one out to play, as in Minne
sota, nor the noise and phone calls of NY.

Ever,

SL

And another ad:

Sinclair Lewis s long-promised novel about preachers-this is it-etc.
(WITH the hope that not too many bar-flies remaining from the old days
won t get an improper memory from the once magic words "this is it.")

_ October 29

Dear Red: y

Your suggestions about advertising are dead right, especially as to the
wisdom of emphasizing that the book has not been serialized and that this
is the preacher novel which has been whispered about. I am told that
Cadman x "whispered" about it over the radio last Sunday.

Ever yours,
Alf

Washington, November i
Dear Alf:

I am enclosing a letter from Bob Sherwood 2 which made me madder
than hell. I suppose that it is in many ways permissible to be a bookseller,
to be 70 and to be a hearty good fellow, and I appreciate all these things
about Mr. Sherwood. I also understand that this book is his one ewe lamb
and that he is trying in this letter, with very poor success, to be humorous
and that he probably does not know that he is being thoroughly insulting.
But I ll be damned if his position as a bookseller can force me into giving
a public endorsement of a book which seems to me thoroughly third rate.
So far as I can remember, I have never met the man except once, at a
booksellers dinner and that for not more than 15 minutes. I am enclosing
a suggested reply to him.

Mr. Sherwood called me up at the Shelton, said that he was sending
up a copy of the book, and would I read it as soon as possible. I said that

1 S. Parkes Cadman, president of the Federal Council of Churches of Christ in
America.

2 Owner of Sherwood s, bookstore in Beekman Street, New York.

226 ELMER GANTRY

I would. Then came this letter, which makes me just a little bit sorer than
anything that has happened to me for at least two or three hours. There is
only one line I like: that is the line in which he says that I am competent
to tell people to go to hell!

The next bleating lamb is this bird from a town which I should think
was probably Frauenfehl in Switzerland who wants some biographical
material about me. Will you please be so good as to write him, explaining
that I send him my almost overpowering love and shoot him the booklet
by Hal?

God, it must be interesting to be a publisher and to be in touch with
the sensitive and undemanding souls of these authors.

SL

November 5

Dear Red:

Alf has been in Chicago this week, and so your letter of November
first with its enclosures has been in my care. I have mailed the letter to
Sherwood today. Gus agreed with me at first in thinking it would be best
to make no reply to the letter at all. But this morning Gus had a letter
from Sherwood telling him a lot about the progress of his book and sug
gesting that maybe he d see you in Washington. Of course you would be
justified in ignoring his letter except it appears that might not be the end
of it and you might as well tell him now as later.

Ever yours,
Don

November 8

Dear Red:

I spent last week in Chicago-most of the time at our sprightly new
textbook office out there, which has been going for over a year but which
neither Don nor I had seen. So I have just read your letter of November
first. You re dead right to write to Bob Sherwood as you did. Of course
you don t want to boost a bum book. We had the manuscript here, and
he pestered us terribly to publish it for him and got Gus pretty much
involved in it. But finally I read the manuscript and got up on my hind
legs and said that the man couldn t write and that I d be Goddamned if
we would publish his book.

Ever yours,
Alf

[1926] 227

November 18
Dear Red:

I have refrained from telling any one that the duplicate manuscript
of the part of Elmer Gantry which I read is in our safe, as I thought it
better to have the complete book burst on every one here in its full glory.
But I find that Hal has unearthed this manuscript, has read it and is com
pletely carried away by it. I think he is planning to run down to see you
some time within the next two weeks or so if that falls in with your plans.

Ever yours,
Alf

Washington, November 22
Dear Alf:

In the next few days I am possibly sending to you Horace Wylie,
and I want you to do absolutely everything you can for him. He is one
of the most pathetic cases I know of in the world. He was once upon a
time a reasonably rich man, of an old and distinguished family, sitting
about clubs in Washington and playing bridge. Then he fell for our
friend, Elinor Wylie-Benet. They eloped, and in order to get a divorce
from his wife he had to give up every single penny he had in the world
to her. Well of course, Elinor then divorced him and married Bill. Since
then he has been trying to make a living by holding down a government
job. This he has lost, and I am told that he is going up to New York to
try to get a job as a holiday-time book clerk in one of the department
stores.

This is not the familiar case of the ex-gentleman who is a drunk and
a rotter; it is the case of a man who has rather too late in life tried to be
efficient. (He s probably 47.) And he has really learned to be efficient;
as a book clerk he would be the man for whom every bookseller must be
looking. He knows books reverently; he speaks three or four languages;
he would be equally courteous to the duchess and the ditch-digger; and
the poor man at the present moment has no great financial ambitions.

You know every bookseller in New York and Chicago, and please
have a very serious talk with Horace, if his pride permits him to come in
and talk to you, and see that he gets a job with a possibility of per
manency. It would seem to me that as that genius wife of his is in New
York, it would be better if he went to Chicago. I think that Marcella
would throw a cat-fit of joy to have him, and that Kroch would really
appreciate him. Anyway, treat him as you would treat me, except for
publishing his books (thank God he hasn t any, so you re safe!).

Bob Sherwood showed up here in Washington. I had him up for a

228 ELMER GANTRY

drink and he was awfully nice. I think he understands now that I am not
going to push his book. He would be a darling if he only did not think
that he had a sense of humor.

Ever,
SL

Early in December Lewis came to the Grosvenor Hotel in New York.

The Grosvenor,
New York,
December 17
Dear Alf, Don and Hal:

This is just* a memorandum in case I forget to speak to you about it
later: I wish you would be particularly careful as to who goes over my
manuscript before it goes to the printers. For example I do not capitalize
he and who and so on referring to the Deity and the ordinary manuscript
editor would carefully change this. I am going down to Washington a
week from today and before I go I shall have the complete manuscript in
to you ready to start setting. I hope you will be able to make the date of
publication before April ist; possibly even March ist, because I am abso
lutely dead certain that there will be rivals coming along some time this
spring, so great is the present interest in religion as for one of many
examples the "Religious Census" recently running in the New York
World.

Ever,
SL

Lewis left the manuscript of Elmer Gantry with Har court and returned
to Washington Christmas Eve.

December 27
Dear Red:

Gantry is splendid! Ellen and I had Monty out for Christmas, so he
read it over the holiday as well as Don and I. We foregathered yesterday
afternoon and gloated over it and finally thought to send you a telegram.
Don thinks it s the best book of the lot. For me it is the best next to Main
Street, and for Monty it is next to Babbitt. Though Monty and I both
admit it has excellences not quite possessed by Main Street and Rabbitt,
I suppose those books were our respective first loves. You should have
seen Monty laughing his head off and wiping his glasses a half dozen times
in the course of reading it. What a sound job it all is!

[1926] 229

I have a few general queries. I would be inclined to let the death of
Sharon go without having Elmer finding her charred body holding a piece
of the cross.

I think Elmer would have been more outraged on the occasion of his
visit to Shallard by what the Ku Kluxers had done to Shallard, though he
would have done nothing about it afterward or publicly.

I would tone down the vulgarities of Elmer on the steamship and in
London and Paris. It is a little too blatant, and he must have picked up a
veneer of manners from some of his parishioners by that time. It is just a
little too thick. Cutting a little will do it.

We all agree you should consider the badger game episode more care
fully and either change it or substitute something for it. A girl clever
enough to get away with being his secretary and unscrupulous enough to
badger him would not devote so much time to so unpromising a prospect
financially. The labor, time, rent of apartment, etc. involved would come
to more than Elmer s resources could stand. So clever a swindler would
have gone after a man with a good deal more money and worked faster.
While Elmer was about due to be badly caught in some of his philander
ing, he might also by this time be too clever and worldly wise to write
letters and be caught so completely off his guard. There are a lot of dif
ficulties in the situation as you have done it which the above observations
will suggest to you. You either have to make the secretary a semi-inno
cent tool in the matter or provide more carefully for a number of con
tingencies. It occurs to us that you have Lulu ready at hand to provide
the situation. She could do something foolish or hysterical. They might
be caught in some piece of carelessness by the reporter who is on to him,
and then have him make final use of Lulu and Floyd or Lulu alone in a
made-up affidavit and statement which will clear his skirts.

I think the thing as it is would just get by, but it s too bad to have a
soft spot at the end of the book, and if you mull over this between now
and when you get the proofs, I am sure you can fix it to the Queen s taste.

Although you may suspect it, you don t know what a grand novel

you have written.

Ever yours,
Alf

December 27
Dear Red:

Last night I finished reading Elmer Gantry, and this morning the
manuscript is going to the printer. It seems to me amazingly good, even

230 ELMER GANTRY

for you, I am glad I waited to read it when it was final and complete.
I had no preconceptions about it except such as I got from talking with
you and Alf and Melville. It seems so much better than I had expected
from those conversations. It is sound and true and complete; it s funny
just often enough; the characters are perfect. I was astonished to find how
familiar the scenes and the lingo were to me from boyhood experience
which I had forgotten. I should expect there are at least a million people
who will get a similar or a greater pleasure from this rediscovery.

I marked a few things in the manuscript which seemed obvious mis
takes in typewriting. I queried a few others which were not so obvious.
It s amazing how complete you ve got the various sides and shades of
religious controversy through your characters and kept them all interest
ing. It s a great book, and I expect it will create some excitement among
the shepherds and their flocks and even in the councils of the ungodly.

Ever yours,
Don

At the end of the month Lewis was back at the Grosvenor in New York.

The Grosvenor
New York
December 31
Dear Alf:

I have kept forgetting to tell you that Secretary of Labor Davis had
a brainstorm when I was in Washington, to the eif ect that he might write
an answer to Elmer Gantry he had the vaguest of ideas as to what
Elmer s like, but I had told him that I was writing a book lambasting
religion and he is, as you probably know, very well-known among the
fundamentalist Christians. Why don t you write to him and see if he is
authentically interested, and if he is send him an advance copy-but not
too soon before the book comes out so that he will spill too many beans.
I think that the spectacle of a Cabinet Member soaring into the book will
be rather pretty publicity. Incidentally he will probably write a lousy
book. Incidentally he is rather a nice fellow, for a Christian.

I d be rather glad if you gave special attention to the volume of
poems by Pierre Loving which you now have in the house. He is an
extremely intelligent fellow and I think it is possible that something might
come out of his work.

SL

[ 1927] 231

[1927]

3028 Que Street, Northwest
Washington, January 4th.
Dear Alfred:

Please have the $2000 sent to me as quickly as possible, for it is the
first of the month and I am strapped. Also I am closing this house up on
January 1 5th. I am thro, quite thro, as far as Hal is concerned. This whole
Washington venture was my last gesture, and it has failed. Physically as
well as mentally I have reached the limit of my endurance. My last gift
to him is complete silence until the book is out and the first heated dis
cussion dies down. For him to divorce God and wife simultaneously
would be bad publicity. I am really ill at the present moment, and I will
go to some sort of a sanitarium to normalize myself.

Elmer Gantry is superb. I hate every one in it but "devastating" is the
only word which will describe the cumulative force of the last third of
the book. It must succeed tremendously on I don t care what score.

My good wishes to you all and wish me in return strength and peace
in the coming year.

Grace

January 5
Dear Grace:

I have your letter of the fourth, and it s a good letter. Hal was all in
last week, and we finally prevailed on him to go up to Bill Brown s Train
ing Camp, Garrison-on-the-Hudson. I got him packed up and drove him
up there New Year s Eve. I haven t heard from him since, but he has
returned some thirty galleys of Elmer Gantry, which he took up there
with him, carefully and sharply corrected. I do hope he gets into better
shape there and builds up some reserves to go on with.

When you say Gantry is superb and "devastating," you ve said it
exactly. We are crowding the job of publication every way we can, but
we can t publish before MarchI should guess the nth. The first edition
will be 100,000, and to get those made and shipped around the country so
that the book will be in stock in San Francisco on publication day is going
to use every moment between now and the middle of March. I think the
rest cure at Bill Brown s is insurance in that direction.

I do really hope you can achieve serenity in the course of time. Of
course I hope Hal can also, but those hopes are much more faint.

Ever yours,
Alf

232 ELMER GANTRY

Lewis returned to New York about the eighth, and during this period of
visits and telephone calls, there were only a "few letters -from the office
about business details.

The Grosvenor, New York
January 25
DearAlf:

I am laying up again in the Harbor Sanitarium for three days, but I
really feel fine and on Friday I shall be buzzing about town, sailing at mid
night on Wednesday next week. I have an awfully good fellowEarl
Blackman of Kansas City who motored with me from Kansas City to
Northern Minnesota to go along for the first four weeks, which is all he
can get away. We plan to walk in southern England or in France if the
weather is bad in England, which will both be lots of fun and get me into
fine shape.

Ever,
SL

Lewis and Blackman sailed for England on February second, but there is
no record of the ship they went over on.

EIGHT

Trouble in Kansas City

and Boston

[1927]
February 9
Dear Red:

I hope you have had a good voyage and a good rest We thought of
you on your birthday this week. I have had a long letter from Stidger.
He doesn t like the book, just as you told him he wouldn t, but hopes for
its success. Kansas City seems het up by talk about it, and the sale there
will start with a rush; in fact, it begins to look as if it will start with a
rush everywhere.

I had a note from Mencken saying it is magnificent even better than
Babbitt, which you know has been his favorite till now. We are taking
the line that the book is a great novel in the best tradition of English
fiction, so that the inevitable scrap about it will head up between the two
groups of readers and go over the publishers and, perhaps to some extent,
the author s head. You wrote it; we ll sell it; the public will scrap about it.

I do hope everything is going well with you and Blackman and that

you re having a fine time.

Ever yours,

Alf

c/o Guaranty Trust Co.,
i rue des Italiens, Paris,
Feb. 24

Dear Alf:

A hundred thanks for the letter with all the news about sales, Bill
Stidger s letter, etc. (When Earl Blackman returns, he ll tell you not only

234 ELMER GANTRY

about the trip and my worthy self but also about an amusing lunch they
all had with Bill just before Earl left Kansas City.)

We had a beautiful crossing with only two rough days, and they not
rough enough to bother us at all; ten beautiful days in England, both
motoring and walking; now two days in Paris; and since Earl has to
hustle backwe re off this evening for a regular hustling American Tour
ist trip to the Italian lakes, Venice, Florence. Then I ll settle down here
for God knows how long.

I really feel very well. I am still tired; it ll take a couple of months
more for me to get that fundamental tiredness out of my system; and I m
living as quietly as possible. I had a beautiful rest on the steamer, and it
was only in London, where I saw too many people, that I dashed about
too much. And meantime the planning of Evening goes on tranquilly.

Ever,
SL

Let me know how Ellen is (and give her my dearest love), and what you
see and hear of Gracie. I shan t write you very much as part of my rest,
I m going to keep my correspondence down as much as I can.

March 4
Dear Red:

Jonathan sails tomorrow on the Baltic, and you may be seeing him
and getting all the news that way. We are coming up to publication date
with a rush. I have never seen anything to touch the advance interest in
Gantry. We are refusing to let all sorts of people have copies in advance
or preach on it in advance or write on it in advance. But I think every one
who should have a copy has had one and feels correspondingly privileged.

We have given the Associated Press material of all sorts about you
and about the book so that they can write their own story. The material
covers the usual biographical stuff, the Kansas City Bible Class, and that
the paper used on the first edition would make a path forty inches wide
from here to Chicago, and so forth, and so on. Of course we are doing
the same thing with the other news services and giving them a copy of
the book so that they can work up their own sensational stuff in their own
way. We have been careful to include in each statement that there are no
portraits of actual people in the book.

We are printing up another carload of paper, which will make the
actual printing before publication 138,000. The Book-of-the-Month Club
will take between 35,000 and 40,000. I expect re-orders to come in
promptly.

I received this morning an advance proof of Mencken s review for

[1927] 235

the April Mercury. It is three pages long and perfectly splendid. Jonathan
expects the book to make an enormous sensation, now that he has read it
all. Rebecca West is going to review it for the Tribune. I suppose she has
to as visiting critic, but it s a little too bad they couldn t find some Amer
ican to do it. The Evening Post is running two reviews next week, one by
Bill Woodward and one by John Roach Straton. 1 A week from now we ll
have a lot of stuff to send you.

I hope you re well and having some fun. What a job it was to write
that book in the time in which you did it!

Ever yours,
Alf

Elmer Gantry was published on March loth.

March 1 1
Cable to
Lewis
Garritus
Paris

Sales about hundred thousand. News stories everywhere. Kansas Star five
columns. Reviews violent either way. Clergy hot. Reorders already. Letter
and clippings mailed. Everything lovely.

Harbrace

March 14
Cable to
Lewis
Garritus
Paris

Reorders Monday eighteen thousand. Controversy hot. Dont talk. Love.

Harcourt

c/o Guaranty Trust Co.,
i, rue des Italiens, Paris which will
remain my address till notice.
Wednesday, March 23

Dear Alf:

To thank you and all the others in detail for the splendid and

complete job of publishing, and for all the letters, cables, clippings since

1 Pastor Calvary Baptist Church, New York City.

236 ELMER GANTRY

would be quite impossible. I can only send you my loudest thanks. I don t
believe I ve missed anything here.

Tomorrow I m off for Italy. I shall wander for several weeks, with
Ramon Guthrie, who s doing a translation for you and who is the most
charming of people. I plan on a cottage and the Simple Outdoor Life for
next summer. AND probably beginning the new novel. If there is to be a
divorce, I m not going to do anything about it till next fall, to avoid
scandal.

I ve just come back from a very happy motoring trip in Touraine,
the great chateau country, and I m doing nothing but loaf and see a little
of Ramon, his wife, Allan Updegraff, who has become extremely nice,
Ludwig and Mrs. Lewisohn. I m feeling well but still tired, which is one
reason why I want to get out of Paris and into the country,

It s been a great battle, the Elmer row, and I imagine it will go on.
Gor, what a gratifying review Mencken s is!

I m delighted that Ellen is about again. Give my love to her and to
the boys in the firm. I m going to write very little as you can imagine,
I ve had enough of writing for a while! but I shall think of you a lot.

BestBEST !
Red

March 31
Dear Red:

The flag, as you know from our reports to you, flies high. I suppose
that my share of Elmer Gantry has been more fun than anything that has
happened since I entered this distinguished office. Now and then I hear of
you, too. Ramon Guthrie writes that he attended a celebration in Paris to
blow off steam after Elmer had sold its first hundred thousand. And the
other day Earl Blackman came in and I had a long talk with him. I confess
that I was a good deal distressed by him. He has the most ardent faith in
the proselyting powers of the book, and actually wept from sheer emo
tionalism when he read Mencken s review. It seemed to me an extraordi
nary spectacle: a Presbyterian pouring out tears of joy at Mencken s most
violent attack on what he was supposed to believe in. He also expected to
lose his church when he got out to Kansas City, although I have a good
many doubts about that. The same day I met his "boss" (whose name I
have temporarily forgotten) and liked him very much. I am sure that he
will do his best for Earl. After Kansas City settles down to whatever state
of grace is customary in that fair city, I expect that everything will blow
over. He is really an extraordinarily fine man (that is, Blackman is) ; I
liked his earnestness and his simplicity. And he certainly is a wiser man

[1927] 237

than when he left these shores. If after all he has to turn into an expert
plumber, there are worse professions than that among which I would
include preaching in a church that believes in the damnation of infants
(or maybe that s the Baptist).

Everybody asks about you and I take great joy in telling them tRat
you never were in better health. I think it was extraordinarily lucky that
you had the sense to leave the country when you did. You would have
been hounded from one end of the United States to the other by tabloids
and by all the freaks in Christendom.

The publicity on Elmer Gantry is amazing, and it still keeps pouring
in. We keep a daily bulletin of sales here, and it is very amusing to watch
it catch on in one territory after the other. We are advertising it, of
course, in every conceivable way from here to the Pacific Ocean. I am
convinced that the vast majority of people are reading it because they at
heart agree with your premise. Incidentally, the antics of the good breth
ren out in Kansas City have been marvelous to behold. I don t know how
much of this rubbish you are absorbing yourself, but I am saving for your
delectation the most extraordinary nonsense that was ever put on paper.
Nevertheless, one finds defenders of Elmer and yourself in the most sur
prising places. Some little paper in the South or the West will burst into
song in the most astonishing way. I presume that as a result of this book
a large number of editorial writers and "would-be" critics have lost their
jobs; but, as I have said before, there is nothing wrong with the plumbing
industry,

I dined with Grace not long ago and took her around to Bill Bullitt s.
She seemed fairly cheerful, although a bad cold had seized hold of the
poor girl. Wells, as I understand, is in town with her now, and I am going
to look her up again before long.

I can t think of any more news from home, but when we sell the two
hundred thousandth copy of Elmer, which isn t so far off, I think we
should send you a diamond-studded wrist watch, provided you promise
not to hand it over to any fair Viennese. Good luck to you. Maybe I ll be
over later myself, I don t know. Irita Van Doren sails April 9th for a
round of literary activities in England and France. Perhaps you will run
across her. She is a little terrified at the prospect of meeting so many
distinguished strangers, and would probably leap right down your throat
if she saw you.

Au revoir. Alf sends his love. He s been deep all day in negotiations
for the motion picture rights.

Yours,
Hal

238 ELMER GANTRY

Hotel d ltalie,
Venice, April 2

DearAlf:

More cables to thank you for. The book looks like a sure 200,000,
perhaps more. I haven t seen the Bennett article yet.

I had to hurry so when I was here with Blackman that I ve returned,
with Ramon Guthrie, and it s a joy just to drift about in a leisurely way,
not try to "see things" but just let them soak in. Spring is coming, with
the Lombard plain, Milan to Verona, hot, green, shining with peach and
almond blossoms, with the snowy Alps beyond.

Fm going to do a couple of very short (1200 words each) articles
here for the Evening Standard, London, to keep my hand in and to
broaden my English audience. I may work them up into a 3000 word
article for America. I may ask you to handle it for me, if Collier s find it
unsuitable. I plan to write a few short stories, this next few months, for
knitting; and wondering just what Elmer had done to my sanctified repu
tation I cabled Grant Overton at Collier s yesterday, "Do you still want
the short stories" and got back this morning "Eager to have first shot at
any short stories you do." I may do two or three while wandering, and
make expenses; then decidedly again not serialize next novel.

From here I ll drift some more in Italy, then to Germany, but Paris
will remain my address.

Bill Stidger in his comments on my book must have been hit hard
from the way he squeals! I shan t answer him; Birkhead will do that.
Thank the Lord I can keep away from reporters here. The vast Venetian
press (if there is any) is almost as much interested in my existence (if
any) as in the fact that Sig. Teodoro Palmieri of Chiogga has a sow which
has just given birth to piglets. Cheers!

Ever,
SL

April 8
Dear Red:

On March 3oth we cabled you that the sales were 150,000. The book
is slowing up a little, but it is still selling at an extraordinary rate 1000 or
1500 a day. I enclose a memorandum of March advertising, which is the
most advertising we ever did in one month for a book; in fact, I think it
is the most ever done here. We have contracted for about $5000 or $6000
more. I am sending you separately proofs of some of the recent ads.

We are all so much pleased by your warm letter of March 23rd
which came drifting in this week, especially in that you sounded as if you

[1927] 239

were better and happier than when we had last heard from you. I think
the trip with Ramon Guthrie must have been fun. I hope it worked out
well. The plan for a cottage in France in the summer is first-rate. Every
thing is serene here, but youVe kept us as busy as a boy killing snakes.

Ever yours,
Alf

On April 1 2th Har court went to White Sulphur Springs for a holiday.
Lewis wrote him a postcard -from Ragusa, Ddmatia, Yugoslavia, on Easter
Day (April ijth) reading, "It s even lovelier than the Italian coast; the
men still wear thick jackets and zouave pants; & I feel fine. DOBAR DAN -
SL"

April 22
Dear Red:

I have just cabled you, in answer to yours from Yugoslavia, as fol
lows: "Sale one hundred seventy-five thousand. Continuing nicely. Boston
has suppressed/ 7 I envy you your present travels, and I hope you are
enjoying them as much as I expect you are.

In regard to the suppression of the book in Boston: There had been
rumors that it might be suppressed, and on the izth District Attorney
Foley notified the booksellers that any further sales would be followed by
prosecution under the Massachusetts law. I enclose clippings wKich give
the important details of what happened after that. You will see that it has
turned into a general fuss about books in that city, and the booksellers,
frightened by the possibility of arrest, have stopped selling a great many
books which have not actually been banned. The Boston press has made
a great deal of the matter, and so has the press throughout the country.
Of course the intelligent opinion is everywhere that the suppression has
made Boston ridiculous.

There seemed to be two courses of action one, to issue a statement
to the effect that this was Boston s business and that we would stop at
tempting to send our travelers and to sell books there and devote our
selves to selling them to the rest of the country; the other, of course, was
to take some kind of legal action. We decided in favor of attempting
something of the latter sort, but I have not at any time been in favor of
going up there and getting arrested and having a sensational criminal trial
with at least an even chance that an Irish jury in Boston might give a
verdict of guilty. I understand the jails are not too good there and the law
provides for a fine and imprisonment up to two years. On Thursday I
went up to Boston with Melville and Gus. We interviewed various people,
including booksellers, the editor of the Transcript, and the president of

240 ELMER GANTRY

Little, Brown and Company, and thon consulted a representative of the
Brandeis firm of lawyers and decided tentatively on the following course
of action.

The idea is to refuse to accept from a given dealer in Boston the
return of unsold copies of the book, we suing them for the payment of
these copies. In defense, they claim that the book has been declared illegal
and that this is a justification for non-payment. We expect that such a suit
will compel a judge to pass an opinion as to whether the book does or
does not violate the law. If we lose we can carry it to a higher court; if
we win the booksellers can resume selling the book. We hope to be repre
sented by very distinguished counsel and at least get whatever credit is
involved in trying to maintain your rights and our rights and the general
right of freedom of the press. There is some indication that the action of
the District Attorney, a nice young Irishman who took office last January,
is backed by the opinion of the Catholic Church, although, of course, the
book itself is not considered an attack on that church. Their paper, how
ever, The Pilot in Boston, has printed an editorial against the book, and
his action in regard to this book and even in regard to books in general is
popular with a considerable section of the voters. I hope you approve of
what we do, though whatever we do will be done before we have a
chance to hear from you. You re lucky to be away because you would
have been besieged by reporters and hecklers of all sorts if you had been
here. We will report as often as there is anything definite.

Alfred has been away last week and this week for a spring vacation
but will be back at the office the first of next week.

Ever yours,

Don

P.S. I have just heard since dictating the above that Hays, 1 who went
up to Boston and on behalf of Liveright made a sale of The American
Tragedy to a policeman, was found guilty in court there this morning
and fined $100, Enlightenment doesn t seem to be in the ascendancy in
Boston at present.

Grand Hotel Imperial
Dubrovnik, Yugoslavia
10:30 PM. Apr. 25
Dear Hal:

Sliding into the shadow of the dark mountains the good (the ex
traordinarily unambitious) ship has just come to rest in Valona, Albania.
I ve just been prowling-below where on a hatch sleep Albanian tribesmen
1 Arthur Garfield Hays, lawyer.

[1927] 241

whom we took on @ Durazzo this morning-one of them with dirk & old
pistol, embroidered white wool trousers & shirt, black wool jacket sashed

with red, pill-box cap with turbanesque veil on it & a face h half

Mongol, half old Greek. Entziickend! Tomorrow Corfu; Athens in a
week. I feel superb-really & I m planning the new novel, tho I shan t get
to real work for many weeks yet. I don t believe I ll be back in America
till fall, if then.

I was so glad to have your letter of March 31, which I got 2 days
ago. I hope you really have had fun out of Elmer. Your work on it has
been magnificent. The violent Kansas City blokes have been asinine. I m
grateful to them for proving the book.

I wish to God I were going to see Irita, but I shan t probablybe
near Paris or London for months.

Do write me again & give me all the gossip. I m so far from it.

Blessings!
Red

May 6
Dear Red:

We ve all been too busy selling books around here to be much good
as correspondents. Ellen and I have had a vacation in West Virginia and
I think Don wrote to you at least once while I was away. I find two good
letters from you and a postcard from Dalmatia. It all sounds splendid.
I hope you can get back to France this summer and start the new novel,
though there s no harm in a few short stories for Collier s to keep your
hand in and the bank balance fat.

There has been an endless lot of backing and filling and discussion
about dramatic and motion picture rights (of Gantry). Stallings went to
the coast and got absorbed in making two new motion pictures. Arthur
Hopkins blew hot and cold and finally they both let go. The motion pic
ture people have been afraid they couldn t get it past Will Hays and it
became clear that the best thing to do was to sell the motion picture rights
from the play if we could get the play arranged for and produced. I have
today signed a contract in your behalf with Robert Milton as the producer
(his last success was The Bride of the Lamb) and Bayard Veiller as dram
atist (his most conspicuous success was Within the Law). One reason
Ann Watkins * and I picked Milton is his great enthusiasm for the book.
I think both he and Veiller would go to the stake for it. Milton seems to

1 New York literary agent.

242 ELMER GANTRY

have ample backing and he has a good theatre in a good location free for
it in New York. You have better than the minimum terms in the Authors
league agreement in practically every contingency. Melville has looked
over and in fact drew most of the final contract incorporating the ideas
Ann and I had so I think it s all in order.

Ever yours,
Alfred

There was a. cable from Lewis -from Athens May yth, and nothing -further
until his cable of May $oth from Paris. Meantime Harcourt cabled twice
to Athens and wrote Lewis a letter re sales.

Cable from Paris May 30
Harbrace
New York

Why dont Grosset start intensive campaign Trail Hawk which is really
story Lindbergh. 1 Can hook up with fact we born forty miles apart

Lewis

June i
Dear Red:

I have your Paris cables. Grosset and Dunlap say they will get right
after your suggestion about The Trail of the Hawk.

Sales (of Gantry) last week bring the total to over 200,000. We
decided on at least another modest burst of advertising on our own hook
before we received your cable. Now we will go ahead with the full
program. You must know, Red, that this continued cooperation on your
part in the arithmetic of publishing is really appreciated by us. I know
it s good business and really believe it increases your total income, but
you re a rare bird of an author to recognize it and to work with us the
way you do.

All sorts of complications have come up in regard to the Boston suit
and we have finally decided to drop it. I went up to Boston on the i8th of
May and spoke at a mass meeting under the auspices of the Women s City
Club. There were over 1000 people at the meeting. I also saw a good
many people there in regard to the situation. There seems to be a definite
and strong movement on foot to have the present law changed. As it
stands now, the fate of a book can be settled on the basis of any words,
or paragraphs, or even phrases which might "tend to corrupt the morals

1 On May zist Charles A. Lindbergh landed in Paris after his trans- Atlantic flight
in the Spirit of St. Louis.

[1927] 243

of the young." The Women s City Club, the state librarians, and a num
ber of first-rate organizations are getting behind the movement to have
the law changed. I think in the present situation a real fight on the part of
a New York publisher would be apt to embarrass them, especially as our
Boston attorneys (Brandeis s old firm) are extremely doubtful if we could
win the case under the present statute.

It will be nice to think of you settled for the summer. I hope you will
feel like starting the new novel and that you are well and happy.

Ever yours,
Alf

Several business letters were written -from the office to Lews in the -fol
lowing weeks, and there is evidence that a letter was received -from him
dated Jime i6th : which was apparently of some length, but which un
fortunately has been lost.

June 27
Dear Red:

Thanks for all you say about Ramon Guthrie. This business is really
getting to be more and more like a club in the way new authors come in
almost only on the recommendation of old authors. I had a pleasant talk
with Guthrie at the time we arranged with him to do the translation of
Bernard Fay s historical book. 1 I hope you can make it clear to him that
we do want him to show us his work just as soon as he is completely free
to do so.

Elmer is slowing up a little. The renewed advertising is helping it
some in day-to-day sales. Publicity of all sorts keeps up. How your books
do get into the lingo of the country!

Your summer plans sound fine. Write whenever you feel like it.

Ever yours,
Alf

Cable from Paris, June 29
Harbrace
NY

Leaving for another walking trip. Please inform Grace. Harry Savage of
Stokes has idea republish Hike and Aeroplane. Tell him this impossible
for credit both themselves and me.

Lewis

1 The Revolutionary Spirit in France and America, HB&Co., 1927.

244 ELMER GANTRY

Munich, July 4

Dear Alf :

I ve had about enough Europe-trotting now, & in three or four weeks
Til be heading for America arriving in four or five. I ll bring with me the
ms of Ramon Guthrie s novel It s contemporary, alive, eager-a corker,
I think, with sales possibilities. If you re away on vacation when I arrive,
I hope you ll be reachable, so I can dash up & see you. Don t let anyone
outside the office know I m coming caution Don, Hal, Gus, Monty et al.
about this. I want to avoid undesirable interviews. I ll keep my name off
the steamer list.

I go from here to Dresden & Berlin, return to Paris, & sail on I don t
yet know which boat. In America I ll probably go for a while to Fred
Howe s place @ Nantucket & work there. Perhaps you & I can have a
few days motoring. It ll be good to see you!

SL

Munich, July 6
Dear Alf:

It occurs to me, just as I am leaving tonight for Berlin, that if Ramon
Guthrie takes a little less or more time in finishing his ms and that if I am
amused in Berlin and stay longer than I expect, it may be better for him
to send his ms directly to you. I wish that you would give it the most
immediate and careful personal attention; and that if you are to be away,
you d leave word with Don or Hal to get right after it. This is because I
think most highly of the novel (my own opinion is shown by the fact that
I have gone over it twice, and with great pleasure), and of Guthrie as a
Harcourt author. If you want the novel as much as I hope you will, I
want you to make an offer immediately, by cable, to Guthrie. He would
want an advance simply to keep going till the next novel is done but he
would be satisfied with a thousand dollars.

Though this is not an aviation or war story, but fundamentally the
story of a man s love for a woman conflicting with his friendship for an
other man, yet the man is an aviator (handled quite differently from any
aviator of whom I ve ever read), and it would be a good thing, if possible,
to seize the present aviation interest.

So will you please give it more careful attention than anything I ve
ever sent your way; and cable Guthrie an acceptance or rejection; and
above all, do take my word that not just as regards this one novel but as
regards all his potential future, Guthrie is the sort of person you are
seeking as a permanent Harcourt author.

[1927] 245

God it s hot. Maybe it is in New York, too. But me-l have beside me
a long, golden, cool glass of Munich beer!

Ever,
SL

July 17
Dear Red:

I just have your note of the Fourth of July saying that you will be
back in America the end of August, It will be good to see you and to find
out just how you are. I think you will enjoy Fred Howe s place and be
able to get to work there. I am rather aiming to be away the end of
August, but I doubt if I will be very far away and maybe you could come
and join Ellen and me where we are. Well be very careful not to let out
that you are returning home.

Ever yours,
Af

DODSWORTH

NINE

Marriage and Divorce

[1927]

Cable from Berlin Jul 24
Harbrace

New York

Staying Europe several months more. Please inform Grace.

Lews

White Grass Ranch
Jackson s Hole, Wyoming
July zcth
Dear Alfred:

Your telegram of the 2 3rd has just been brought in by a cowboy, so
gloriously inaccessible is this place, tho a great deal of the glory is being
dimmed for me. I had planned my summer pretty much up to October ist
when last week I got a letter from Hal in Munich dated July 2nd saying
he would be back in New York in six weeks and would I go to Nantucket
with him for the rest of the summer. My God! seems to be the only ade
quate comment on this. And now today your wire comes saying he is
remaining in Europe for several more months. What with the altitude of
6000 feet and my low blood pressure, and the fact that I don t sleep at
nights, I think I had better return East sooner than I had planned or I ll
be inviting you to a rather tasty funeral-Even so I think you and Has
tings would adore this country, but it s no place to be zm-certainly un
happy in. Keep me posted by wire of any new developments. God bless
you and God help me!

Grace

Also my watch is stopped, my typewriter is busted, and I catch field mice
every night in my room.

250 DODSWORTH

Berlin, July 26
Dear Alf:

As I cabled you a couple of days ago, I m not, after all, coming home
this summer. I like Berlin, & I m getting the stuff here for Blind Giant.
In August, I m going to have some more walkingstarting in England but
possibly going to Scandinavia, then settle down here, possibly for months.
So I ll see Don here, I hope. I hope to see Cane.

I had a lovely week doing the abortive revolution in Vienna 1 & flew
for the first time comfortable, & slightly monotonous with nice little
paper bags to be sick into which I wasn t.

Seems to me there ought to be. a big new ad campaign on Elmer in
late September, (I d come in on it, of course), with entirely new forms of
ads. Reprint the freak items Billy Sunday s attacks; the story of the man
in Kansas City who was arrested for stealing an Elmer, etc. But emphasize
this: You have heard about E.G., you have talked about it, but have you
READ it? You may hate it or love it, but there must be a lot to this book
which has caused more talk than any book since Main Street. Hundreds
of preachers & editorial writers have said "The book can be ignored" &
then they ve ignored it for a whole column or a whole sermon. What is
there in the book to stir them to such passionate interest? Read it & see.

How about it?

Red

Hotel Atlantic
Der Kaiserhof
Berlin, Aug. 3
Dear Alf:

Will you please send Our Mr. Wrenn, The Trail of the Hawk, The
Job, Free Air and Main Street to Mrs. Dorothy Thompson, 8 Handelstr.,
Tiergarten, Berlin. These are to be charged to me.

I am off in a week for a month s hiking around England. The Ber-
liners have been particularly nice to me and I have had a lot of literary
editors come and call on me. Especially nice has been Lion Feuchtwanger,
the author of Jew Suss, who wants to dedicate a new book to me.
Rowohlt (publisher) is a truly charming fellow and I am sure that he is
going to do much more with my books than Wolff did.

Ever,
Red

1 Lewis met Dorothy Thompson one evening in Berlin, and when as the corre
spondent of the New York Evening Post she flew to Vienna the next day, Lewis
obeyed a sudden impulse to take the same plane.

[1927] 251

There were no letters -from Lewis while he was in England. He arrived
back in Germany early in September when there was an exchange of
cables, and then no further communication until his letter of September
30th.

Herkules-Haus, Berlin
Sept. 30
Dear Alf :

What s the news? Does Gantry keep going? When will the drama
tization be produced? When s Don coming? I ve been settled down very
peacefully in Berlin ever since my five cheerful weeks in England & the
Rhineland, & just to get my hand in before starting the new novel, I ve
written a 15,000 word story for Mencken. Tomorrow I go to Paris to see
Mel Cane before he sails, but I ll return here. I m going to talk to him
about (say nothin of this to nobody) the possibilities of a Paris divorce.
It s quite clear now that there never will be a reconciliation tho I hope
& believe that Grace & I will remain friendly. Quite possibly we ll actually
be friendlier than if we were tied together.

I hope the new book (the title of it begins to look more like Exile
than Sunset or any of the other previous choices) won t be over 110,000
words long, & that it will be finished in the spring possibly, thus, ready
for publication a year from now. Then, I think, when I get back to Amer
ica, I ll tackle Neighbor again. That book has remained with me, like
Main Street, despite several failures to get it going. I m terribly glad
you ve taken Guthrie s novel, 1 & I hope you like it as well as I do. Write
me what you & the others think of it.

Mit as we Germans say

Herzlichen Griiss,
Red

Brace wrote to Lewis that he and Mrs. Brace were sailing for London on
October $th and expected to get to Paris about November $tb.

Berlin, Wednesday
Dear Don:

Your letter announcing your sailing came just this morning. I m most
eager to see you, but as after so long a loaf I m up to my ears in the new
book, I feel disinclined to come to London. Also, I want you to see Berlin.
Can t you come up? It s only about twelve hours from London, via Hook
of Holland.

1 Parachute, 1928.

252 DODSWORTH

I d vaguely planned to go to Russia, but I don t think I shall now;
I think I ll stay here and work. The only time I plan to be out of town
is this coming weekend, when I m going to the country with a news
paperman who has a shooting box (as, I believe, such objects are called)
in Thuringia. Why not skip up here for a few days, or, later, go to Paris
via Berlin and Munich stopping perhaps in Holland for a day or two on
your way here?

Love to Ida. I m feeling immense better than I have for two or three
years.

Ever,
Red

October 13
Dear Red:

I am more than glad to have your good letter of September 30th, and
I am chagrined at how the weeks have slipped by without my writing to
you. I had a real three weeks holiday. I think both Don and Hal have sent
you some bulletins on how things were going. Sales (of Gantry) have
really been first-rate since the first of July 19,400, making a grand total
since publication of 229,000, which is, after all, a pretty good total easily
twice that of any other novel published this year. We are trying some
striking billboard stuff now as a reminder about the book, feeling that the
public has seen so much of it in the newspapers and magazines that they
are apt to take advertisements in such places for granted and that the law
of diminishing returns is apt to get in its usual deadly work. We are going
to keep right after it through the fall, and I think a total of 250,000 is
pretty sure. I think, too, that as a document on the subject the book is
going to have the life of a non-fiction book in addition to the life it de
serves as a novel.

Melville landed yesterday, and I have just talked with him over the
telephone. His report of you is fine, and you must know how happy it
makes me. It s all borne out, too, by the tone of your letter and the news
therein.

The dramatization is not yet in rehearsal. Veiller has had a great
success with The Trial of Mary Dugan, which went on early in August
and which will make his name? bulk all the larger as your dramatist. The
contract calls for production this year. I was to hear more about it this
week and I ll write to you after I do.

Your news about the reason for your trip to Paris is not real news
because Grace has been interested to consult me in an entirely friendly

[1927] 253

manner about her feelings and problems in regard to it. I am sure it s a
good thing all round. I am doubly convinced that one of the most impor
tant steps in her life and yours must be taken carefully for the benefit of
everybody concerned. I think this would be true of ordinary people, but
with people of your prominence it s essential that there should be no
possibility of a comeback. Bernie l and Melville know all about it, and
you can safely be guided by them. I think Grace is to go to Nevada just
after the first of the year, and I hope it will work out on that basis. I think
it will be better for her health, for you, and for everybody if it s done
that way.

We had a cable from Don this morning that he arrived in London
and is at the Mayf air.

I am glad to know about the 15,000 word story for Mencken. Won t
you send me a carbon copy or ask Mencken to send me early proofs?
And Exile strikes me as just the right title for the new novel. I am glad
Neighbor lingers with you. I have taken the contract for it out of the safe
several times and given it a little pat.

Everything is serene with us. We are having a whale of a year s
business. Ellen and I have bought a house on the shore of the Sound just
above Greenwich where there ll be room and a welcome for you when
ever you re ready. We hope to move in the end of the month. Hastings
is in Meikle John s 2 Experimental College out at Wisconsin trying to find
out what it s all about. Write again when it comes handy.

Ever yours,
Atf

October 14
Dear Red:

Continuing my letter of yesterday: The dramatization of Gantry is
practically complete, and it goes into rehearsal early in November with
production in view in December perhaps just before Christmas. I hear
that the first two acts are scrumptious; they re mainly characterization.
The trouble Veiller is having now is the transition between the second
and third acts.

As rumors increase about the next novel, inquiries about serial rights
will also increase and folks will start pestering you. I think we have both
learned it is better not to serialize, but if you should decide to, I am con-

* Bernard M. L. Ernst, lawyer and partner of Melville Cane.
2 Alexander Meiklejohn, professor of philosophy and chairman, Experimental
College, University of Wisconsin.

254 DODSWORTH

vinced you can get more for it when it s done than you can for the idea
and be saved an awful lot of bother in the meantime.

Ever yours,
Alf

On October 22nd Lewis cabled that he was sailing for New York immedi
ately, but he cabled again a few days later that he was remaining in Berlin
after all.

October 25
Dear Alf:

When I telegraphed you last week that I was sailing immediately for
New York, it was because it looked as though Grace would keep chang
ing her mind, keep putting off things for months and months; and Cane
had just cabled me that a German divorce, like a Paris divorce, might
easily be invalidated, or at least seriously questioned, later, in the Amer
ican courts. So I decided to go to Nevada myself, and get the thing really
done. I had my ticket, and had my trunks completely packed, ready to
be off for Hamburg tomorrow morning, when last evening came cables
from both Cane and Grace, suggesting that I stay, and that it would make
Grace miserable (it was such a fine, sincere wire from her) if she felt that
she had made me interrupt the work on Exile. She is now, apparently,
really ready to go West about mid-January.

It would, of course, be much better to remain here till I get Exile
done remain an exile myself till then! So, rather weary after getting
everything done for sailing, I decided to get everything undone again and
here I am, back at work (and hoping to get my trunks back from Ham
burg by tomorrow! ) . I ll hope to be home before next summer, with the
book all done; or, if I don t come myself, to have the ms in your hands
early in May, or earlier, all ready for fall publication.

I m grateful to you for all your news about Elmer, advertising, the
play, and so on, and please go on giving me details and please be sure to
thank Hal for his letter, and his proof from the billboard people. This
seems to me an excellent stunt. But I think you might also do the news
paper stunt which I suggested of a conglomeration of the principal sensa
tional clippings about Elmer, because really we are justified in saying that
since Uncle Tom no book has been so discussed,

I want so much to see your new house. Christen a room for me.

I ve come as I think I ve written you to have the most immense
personal liking as well as business respect for Ernst Rowohlt so much so
that I hope some day for a Harcourt-Cape-Rowohlt alliance. And asking
various littery gents here, I find that they have the same sort of respect

[1927] 255

for him that people who knew had for Don and you while the firm was
still small. . . . Here s the sort of thing he does: Having had Gantry
translated by quite a good man, he s having Count Montgelas, who spent
several years in America, go over the proofs again, at a fair expense.

I m hoping to see Don before he sails. I wrote him in London asking
him if he couldn t come here between London and Paris, then when I
expected to sail I got him on the long-distance phone and explained now
I ll explain again all over! I hope to get him here before he sails.

About the story for Mencken: It s just possible that we may want to
make a small (60,000) word book out of this and three others. It s the
account by a Babbitt, entirely in his own words without any comment by
the author, as to how he called on Coolidge in the White House and not
till the last page do we find that he never really saw Coolidge. Of course
I love this sort of drool and it ll be my swan-song to Babbittism. I want
to wait till I hear from Menck as to how it strikes him, and then, if he
finds it good, I ll send you, as you suggest, a carbon of the story, and see
what you think about a book of this stuff.

Alf, I haven t for years felt so serene, well, secure. You d better get
ready to publish several nice lil books by Sinclair Lewis, now that he s
gone through his apprenticeship and begun to live. You delicately hint as
though you had heard of Dorothy; that s why, though I m still devoted to
German beer and wine, I haven t had and, what is more curious, haven t
wanted, a drop of whisky, gin, rum, brandy or any of their delightful but
rather destructive little brothers for a long time now. Write me here I ll
be here till about January ist, at least.

Ever,
SL

995 Fifth Avenue,
New York City
October 25th.
Dear Alfred:

As Hal is as much addicted to telegrams and cables as Jesse Lasky,
you probably heard from him this morning. I heard the following: "All
right remain Europe writing."

A few more of these colon-upsetting cables and you will receive
concerning me an engraved invitation to Campbell s Luxurious Funeral
Parlors. The possibility of Hal s return, just as I had calmly settled myself
in the obscurity of upper Fifth Avenue until after Wells Christmas holi
days, destroyed the work of two weeks. Hal will kill me if he doesn t stay

256 DODSWORTH

put. Cane and Ernst are corkers and so are you, but the general wear and
tear is frightful.

Have you seen Charlie Shaw s almost scurrilous vignette of Hal in
the last Vanity Fair? As he only knew Hal during that insane period last
winter, his deductions are undoubtedly fair, but I do hate the idea of them
being incorporated in a book.

I am back as you see at the old address but in a higher and sunnier
flat, where I hope to remain, Hal willing, until after Wells 7 Christmas
holidays. I want so much to shield Wells from all unpleasantness, and
Christmas holidays mean so much to little boys. The day after he goes
back to school, I shall take a train for Reno. Meanwhile I shall do my
spineless best to eject this arthritic poison from my tired old body and
I have a birthday tomorrow! ! !

With trust and affection,

Grace

Berlin, October 27
Dear Hal:

I was delighted to hear from you and to have tidings about the
progress of Elmer, but I wish you d given more details about yourself and
whom you re seeing and the village scandals, if any.

I m really feeling immense after all my wandering, especially after a
lot of walking in Alsace, the Rhineland, the Schwartzwald, Cornwall, and
Shropshire, and I m settled down to the quietest kind of life, seeing very
few people while I work on the new novel. I wish to God I could get you
to run away and come over here for a time. I d be awfully glad to break
away and wander with you. Why don t you? It s been so long since
you ve been in Europe.

Let me hear again, you profuse young correspondent!

Ever,
Red

Without warning Bayard V tiller sent an announcement to the newspapers
that he had given up the dramatization of Elmer Gantry.

November 7
Dear Red:

Your good letter of October 25th makes me warmly happy. I am
glad to have your testimony about Ernst Rowohlt. Everything that I have
heard confirms what you say about his intelligence and interest.

I d like to see the carbon of the story for Mencken, no matter what
he says about it. Of course I m just tickled to death that Exile is going so

[1927] 257

well and that we may have it for next fall. After all we have done with
Gantry this year, the lack of a novel from you would be sorely felt in our
sales next year. Thanks to Gantry and the rest of our list, our sales will
pretty nearly reach a million and a half this year-which is a whale of a
publishing business.

I just have your cable: "Oughtn t we to sue Veiller. Is Milton getting
new dramatist and who." This situation is still a little too tangled for me
to take definite action. I have been in close touch with Cane about it.
We are in a perfect position legally, as our contract refers only to a
dramatization by Veiller, and if the play is not produced by December
first all rights revert to us and we keep the $2000 paid on account with
out any obligations to anybody. Veiller s announcements attracted so
much attention that I think we ll have no difficulty in reselling the dra
matic rights to one of several producers once we are free to do so. But I
want to be careful not to open negotiations with anyone else until after
this contract has cleared itself up. There are all sorts of tales about it.
Veiller has a great hit on, The Trial of Mary Dugan, which is making him
a couple of thousand dollars a week. I hear vaguely that the District At
torney has been making threats to close up Mary Dugan, and I hear still
more vaguely that some of the church people have used this as a club to
scare him off Elmer Gantry.

Ever yours,
Alf

Berlin, Nov. 12
Dear Alf:

I m still waiting for word from you re Veiller s chucking ms-Fve
seen only newspaper clips. Something must be done. Could we get Stal-
lings, O Neill, or Sidney Howard to dramatize it?

I think in January ads you ought to have some more notices of
Gantry, however small. True, as you say, that many ads this fall would
seem simply repetition. But after that period, if we don t advertise, people
will think the book is dead-indeed it will become. dead & this one I think
we could keep alive. I wish you d give particular attention to it. Nothing
moves slower than the religious mind, especially as I know it in the West.
If you ll go ont advertising, with claims of "still best seller after one year-
still most sensationally discussed book of century" I think you may hit a
whole new stratum of readers. And drive the idea home: "You, Mr.
Church-goer, if you haven t read Gantry, instead of taking your pastor s
word for it, you don t know what your own church & your own faith
really mean today."

258 DODSWORTH

And how about a $1.50 edition, instead of letting Grosset & D. have
all the skimmed milk? One with a preface of the most violent attacks &
boosts? Call it Pulpit Edition? Publicity in that.

Exile is going apace. You ll have it by next May, for publication in
Autumn 1928, & I hope it won t run over 120,000 perhaps less. And you
may have it by late March, for publication in late August.

Both Mencken & Nathan seern most unusually enthusiastic about
"The Man Who Saw Coolidge." I ve asked Menck to send you proofs.
I might, for 1929, either do a volume of 4 such drools by Mr, Lowell
Schmaltz, or use this story with the few very best of my published short
stories e.g. "Hobohemia" & "Willow Walk." I wish you d read this one
& perhaps talk it over with Menck & see what you think. ... I already
have plans for three possible other drools by Mr. Schmaltz. So sorry I ll
miss Don.

Ever,
SL

Berlin, November 29
Dear Alf :

I ve neglected to answer your query about Rowohlt s financial re
sponsibility. So far as I can find out, it s perfect. One thing: he s Emil
Ludwig s publisher, and Mr. Ludwig is one of the very best at collecting
every cent that s coming to him.

I ve finished 50,000 words of the first draft of the new novel and
today I m running away to Russia, but only for a couple of weeks, then
back to work. Yes, she s up in Russia, drat her!

Ever,
SL

November 29
Dear Red:

I have been out Chicago-way for a week and on my return find a
budget of mail from you, including your cable about advertising. I am
sorry if some expression I used about advertising has worried you. I sup
pose it s a sign of middle age and a temperamental inclination to promise
less than I expect to perform that crept into my letter to you. We have
gone right ahead with advertising. The ad you suggested a conglomera
tion of newspaper headlines with "HAVE YOU READ ELMER GANTRY?" in a
blank space in the middle appears next Sunday in the Times here and
next week in Chicago.

[1927] 259

Unless Milton comes through in the next two days with a proposal of
a satisfactory dramatist for Gantry, he will receive a formal note from
Melville on the first of December informing him that he has not fulfilled
his contract and that that contract is null and void. Then we ll be free to
move in other directions.

What you say about Rowohlt and Gantry is fine. I think there is a
chance for a big German sale on it.

One of the nicest books we have published lately is Carl Sandburg s
The American Songbag. All the old stuff is in it and a lot of Carl, too.
I am sending it along to you, hoping it will arrive before Christmas and
make you homesick.

Your recent letters sound as if you are hard at work on the new
novel. Your tone changes when you get absorbed. Good luck to you and
to it!

Ever yours,
Alf

December 9
Dear Brother:

I know your faith and I know your works and you should be
informed that through some friends of mine I have had the privilege and
I hope you appreciate what a privilege it isto read in advance of the mass
of the American public an account of a trip to Washington by a good
American citizen and a classmate of Coolidge, which, not only because of
what it tells of the President and the sound doctrines of American man
hood and manners which it inculcates, but also as a revelation of our
democracy and the opportunity which this great land affords, is bound to
do good, not only now, but for years to come.

The piece is perfectly splendid. I haven t had more fun over anything
for a long time. I think it would make a little book. I have asked Don to
read it and see what he thinks. I don t believe I would combine it with
anything else unless it were exactly in the same key. Will you cable if it
is all right for us to publish it next spring as a little book at $1.00, a la
Irvin Cobb s Sfeaking of Operations 1 ? One reason for doing it is that it
is really genial and a pleasant farewell to Babbittry for you.

I hope you had a good time in Russia. Ellen and I are hoping that you
and "she" will come over here in the spring and settle down with us for
as long as you please. Our new house is lovely. A piece of the Sound is
just across the road from us. It s quiet; there aren t many neighbors, but
lots of people are in reach if and when we want them. There s even a little
farmer s cottage, which I bought so that no one else could get it, which

260 DODSWORTH

might do nicely for a honeymoon or for finishing a novel, with meals and
service from our house if that arrangement might be more fun.

Ever yours,

Alf

P.S. Our spring list goes to the printer Monday. We shall put The Man
Who Knew Coolidge into the list, and shall expect you to cable immedi
ately on receipt of this if you do not agree to our publishing it this spring.
Don enjoyed it as much as I, and points out that it should be done this
spring, as the splendid title will lose much of its force if the piece is
published after the Presidential campaign starts with Calvin out of the
running and on the shelf.

Cable from Berlin Dec 1 1
Harbrace
New York

Just returned Russia. If you publish Coolidge skit alone twill be merely
timely pamphlet also being serialized Mercury have smaller sale. Can and
wish unite it with three similar pieces be called something like Soul of
Lowell Schmaltz as complete novel to have enduring sale. Probably never
be desirable for me do more than one such stunt and shame waste it with
this quarter finished effort. Now that Mencken and you approve could
do rest even better yet not make whole long enough be boring. Can write
this stuff incredible speed and have whole mailed in four weeks to be
published coming spring as fortyfive to sixty thousand word book two
dollars or one seventy five. Never had stronger hunch and advise you
agree turn little item into big book. Had conferences State Publishing
House Russia. Believe can arrange convention we get royalties my and
other books they publish including my back royalties if you pay equal
royalties on such of theirs you publish. You can also arrange same behalf
other American publishers. Shall write terms etc if you cable that I free
start proceedings which you OK later.

Lewis

December iz
Cable to
Sinclair Lewis
Herkuleshaus
Berlin

While could get more dollars this spring from Schmaltz volume you
describe we feel most readers may know all they want to of him from

[1927] 261

this piece. Urge Man Who Knew Coolidge as title anyway. You know
rest of material and must decide but keep present title. We will recipro
cate Russian royalties. If you write terms will lay before Publishers Asso
ciation. Think most publishers will pay on modern books but not on
pre-revolution noncopyrights like Tolstoi.

Harcourt

Cable from Berlin Dec 13
Harbrace
New York City

Alright keep title Man Who Knew Coolidge but expect book fifty thou
sand words. Shall make it exactly that length. Am sure Russians expect
royalties only new books. Dont lay formally before Publishers Associ
ation till I send details. Must still correspond Russia.

Lewis

December 14
Dear Red:

There will probably be a lull now in the exchange of cables about
The Mm Who Knew Coolidge. We also have the description of the new
material, and it sounds fine. Of course we ll make a $2.00 book. This vol
ume seems to me to be of the order of Mantrap rather than of the order
of Gantry, and we shouldn t spend as much money in advertising this as
Gantry or Exile. The sales may be large; if so, it is apt to be because
people will find reading it great fun and recommend it to each other. If
after we have the book out and the problem of more advertising comes
up, we can make a special arrangement about that as we have on various
occasions.

This stuff is so amusing that I think we re all doing the right thing to
pick up what odd change we can out of it this spring. If Exile should get
done for the autumn, well and good. If you need more time to work it
over lovingly, that will be all right anyway.

Don t force the new material to 50,000 words if it doesn t come
naturally. The various scenes and occasions of the Schmaltz monologues
enable you to cover a wide range, but it s much better to have too little
than too much of such highly humorous, satirical material.

Ever yours,
Alf

262 DODSWORTH

December 22

Dear Red:

About the dramatic version of Gantry: As I wrote you before, we
were not free to move in the matter until Milton s failure to produce
Veiller s version by the first of December actually outlawed his contract.
Finally, after a week or two of negotiation, I signed a contract last week
with Patrick Kearney, who dramatized An American Tragedy, to make
a play from Elmer. 1 - He is het up about the book, has good ideas for the
play,- and he s the best we could find.

The January Mercury with "The Man Who Knew Coolidge" went
on the stands yesterday. We are setting March as a tentative publication
date but may switch that around, according to when we can get the com
plete material in pages to show to the Book-of-the-Month Club. We ought
to give them -a chance at it, and one month may be better than another
for them. Experience seems to show that both the Book-of-the-Month
Club and the Literary Guild are exceedingly useful as advertising besides
the actual cash which a sale to them brings in.

We are winding up the best year we have ever had, with sales run
ning a little over a million and a half. And you re winding up the best
year you ve ever had. So everything is lovely, and the goose hangs high.

Ever yours,
Alf

Berlin, Dec. 23
Dear Alf:

Within four days I expect to start off to you all the rest of The Mem
Who Knew Coolidge. I mailed to you a few days ago the revised first part
with the front matter. I expect the whole thing to come out 48 or 50,000
words.

Sometime next week I hope to be able to send you practically the
whole manuscript of the articles which Dorothy Thompson is doing for
the New York Evening Post and the Philadelphia Public Ledger likely
to be sold by them to the Boston Transcript and other papers alsoon
Russia. To me it seems the best stuff I have ever read on Russia, but prob
ably I am prejudiced. It really gives a clear idea of such matters as the
Red Army, the evolution of a new High Society in Russia, how one really
lives there, and a lot of other things. I think it would really make a peach
of a timely book, particularly interesting to all business men who are

1 After a try-out in Cleveland, Patrick Kearney s dramatization of Elmer Qtmtry 9
under direction of William A. Brady, was presented by Joseph E. Shea at The Play
house Theatre, New York City, August 9th, 1928.

[1927] 263

wondering whether they can do business with Russia; and as to the com
plete authenticity of her material, I can vouch myself.

As soon as I finish The Man Who Knew Coolidge I amafter a
week s vacation in the mountains going to get right back to Exile and I
hope to have it ready for publication at latest January first 1929. It would
probably be as well not to publish it next fall, because the book after that
is very likely to be Neighbor and I should think that would entail a couple
of years work.

Dorothy and I myself seem to find the new part of The Man Who
Kne*w Coolidge at least as good as the first, and getting rather more away
from immediate timeliness, so that I think there is a ghost of a possibility
with this of another 200,000 sale anyway, be prepared for such a possi
bility.

Feeling fine despite going so hard and I want to send all of you my
warmest Christmas greetings.

Ever,
Red

[1928]
January 6

Dear Red:

We are looking, for the complete manuscript of The Man Who
Knew Coolidge by the next steamer, and we shall attend to careful proof
reading here. We now have a first-rate person for that sort of thing in the
office. She may do it, or we may have Feipel do it and then superimpose
her judgment on his. I wonder what the Britishers and Germans will make
of this book-if it will match their sense of humor.

We are in our usual position as regards the contract. I have sent you
one on the basis of Mantrap. I couldn t help snickering at finding that we
are again trying to get you to take a little more and you re arguing for a
little less. I think you had better let us have our way this time and sign
the contracts that are sent to you on the understanding that if we need
more room for advertising we ll lower the royalty on a^certain number of
copies to 10% and spend the difference in special exploitation.

The Dorothy Thompson articles * will have our prayerful consider
ation. It sounds good to me.

Love to you both.

Ever yours,

Atf

i Later in the year the articles were published by Henry Holt and Company
under the title New Russia.

264 DODSWORTH

Lewis remained in Berlin longer than he had planned, all the while Work
ing on Dodsworth. And then mid-March there was a letter from him from
Italy.

c/o American Express Company,
Naples, March 19
DearAlf:

Here! and here instead of Sicily because there are villas to be had,
and, I learned, few if any in Sicily. Indeed I m moving into one today-
small but charming, and very quiet, with the most beautiful view of the
sea and Vesuvius and the village-lined distant shores, and a big garden to
walk in and breakfast in. I have the villa for exactly seven weeks after
which, England and the caravan.

I have finished 105,000 words of the first draft of Exile, and hope to
have the whole first draft finished before I leave here on the caravan
trip, it will be easier to concentrate on rewriting than on first draft. I feel
so content and well. And Frn thinking of Neighbor, and of the dim pos
sibility of going to California say, next September and seeing if one
could obtain without too much cost, a tiny fruit ranch which would make
a real home, with American background, yet with something of the
climate and the beauty of Italy, and which would almost or quite pay for
itself. But that s far ahead, and to be talked of when I reach NY. I
wouldn t want an expensive pretentious place like Jack London s, but it
would be nice to have one in which there might be some tiny income
instead of all outgo. And which one could leave in charge of the farmer-
boss and go abroad once in two years. I mention all of this only to indicate
a rather contented and happy outlook on the future now!

Even with the Nevada business, it looks as though it would cost me a
fair amount less this year than last. More sanity in spending. For example,
the rent of the villa is only $250 for seven weeks as against $600 a month
for that dratted big house in Washington in the fall of 1926 and two
servants at about $50 a month for the two, instead of, as in Washington,
three servants costing, if I remember, over $200 a month! And a more
charming place!

About the book no, Home would not be the right title, doesn t
sound right. Nor is The Y earner zs the book comes out, though the wife
is a yearner she is so much less important in the book than the husband,
who is in no tiny degree a yearner, and the title might seem to refer to
him. The title I most want, A Man Alone, has been used, 1 and recently.
Fortunately, there is no hurry. If you should have to announce it ahead

1 George Agnew Chamberlain: Mem Alone, Putnam, 1916.

[1928] 265

of time, better stick to Dodrworth 1 as title. It fits the book, as you ll see.
You say "I d guess this would be a good time to get away from the name
title." Well in the first place, I ll certainly get away from it after this time
whether my next is Neighbor or some shorter ad interim novel to do
while laboring over the long task of preparation for Neighbor. And sec
ond, as I ve pointed out, with the success of hundreds of such titles as
Nicholas Nickleby, David Copperfield, Martin Chuzzlevxt, Oliver Tivist,
The Newcombes, Ethan Frame, David Harum, to say nothing of the
well-known novels called Babbitt and Elmer Gantry, there is a question
whether any title can in the long run after the first introductionbe more
distinctive, satisfactory, and memorable than a name title. (Oh yuh, one
might also mention fere Goriot & Mme* Bovary.)

Do you know that the great General Conference of the Methodist
Church meets in Kansas City this yearI think in May? This is the con
ference of the whole blooming Methodist Church (North) ; it meets only
once in four years; it elects bishops and decides vast policies; and it must
be attended by thousands, preachers and laymen. Now they re going to
talk a lot about Elmer Gantry, particularly as they meet in Kansas City.
Why don t you arrange to have all K.C. booksellers have large stocks of
Elmerii necessary on consignmentwith special advertising. For a lot of
these Methodists, including some who have preached on the book, will not
have seen it, and might buy it if it were there at hand, whereas they ve
never had the chance in their little towns.

I can see special advertising to the effect: Greetings to the General
Conference: You have read and talked about E.G. maybe preached about
it but have you read the book itself? You have heard that Gantry is a
scoundrel, but do you know that in Frank Shallard and Mr. Pengilly, one
a liberal and one a fundamentalist, Mr. Lewis has produced two of the
noblest and most inspiring of preachers in fiction? No novel about the
church has ever been more talked of none has ever been more praised or
more denounced read it and see why.

As all these Methodists will go back to every quarter of the country
and talk, it s not just a question of how many they buy themselves but
what they start. I can even imagine a billboard, near the entrance of each
of the churches at which they hold meetings, giving some such gospel
message as I have outlined above. I think this would be awfully worth
doing, whatever the cost. (Heh? Sure I ll come in on cost.) Might give
new life to the book. If you use the billboards, put on them "To be
bought in almost every bookshop in Kansas City"-because the Methodist
Book Concern probably does not handle the book. Mightn t it be worth

iThe other titles Lewis considered for the book were Evening, Exile, Sunset,
Blind Giant.

^,, DODSWORTH

266

the expense to send some one, possibly even Hal, to Kansas City for this
stunt? . . . And there might be a good news story in it.

How about my suggestion that Ellen and you join me for a week or

two this summer? Be room.

Ever,

SL

For about four months, during which Le<wis lived in the villa in Naples
and then went to England, he had little occasion to write his publishers.
He was actively engaged in completing Dodsworth.

April ii

Dear Red:

It has been a long time since I ve written you, although I hear
occasional echoes of what you are doing abroad. The Man Who Knew
Coolidge * is launched and on the whole, as you probably know, the
reviews are favorable. Canby and Hansen were both enthusiastic and the
Times treated you to a front page. Your old friend in Chicago, Fanny
Butcher, 2 turned both thumbs down.

The General Conference of the Methodist Church is to be held in
Kansas City in Convention Hall during the entire month of May. We are
going in for an extensive billboard campaign which will cover the whole
city. It would have cost just about as much to have tried to take isolated
billboards near the Convention Hall and churches, and we have made up
our mind that it would be better to do the job thoroughly. Consequently,
there will be 49 billboard displays in Kansas City including 1 3 illuminated
boards in the center of the town. Altogether it will run to $1000, but we
feel sure it will be worth it since, as you said, "all these Methodists will go
back to every part of the country and talk." We will, of course, have as
many copies of Elmer Gantry in the bookstores by May i as we are able
to force on them.

I find life now in New York as entertaining as ever, but this winter
has been somewhat exhausting. Claire has been abroad for the last two
months and probably won t be back till June. I don t believe you will run
across her trail because she s in southern France and then is going to Spain.
It s hard to keep the girls at home these days.

Yours,
Hal

On April 1 6th Mrs. Lewis obtained a Reno divorce.

1 Published April 5th.

2 Reviewer and columnist on the Chicago Tribune.

[1928] 267

Savoy Hotel
London, W.C.
May 6
Dear Hal:

So good to hear from you. You probably know by now that Dorothy
Thompson and I will be married, here in London, a week from tomorrow.
You ll see her, if you re in New York, probably about mid-August which
means you will see me mit. We ll probably buy a farm somewhere in
New England, Maryland, or California. Perhaps you can take a day or
two off and run around with us, looking at places. I wish I had a place
like Carl Van Doren s.

Yes, sure: bring the royalty on Gantry down on the next 5000, to
pay for my half of the Kansas City display. Let me know what comes of
the stunt, and what the newspapers say that the preachers say.

Cape tells me there is a fine advance sale on Man Who Knew
Coolidge herehe publishes on May 11.

I feel fine. I m looking forward so keenly to caravanning all summer
here, but also I m beginning to be keen to see America again, and I ll be
excited to sail and to see you-all. ver

Red

Salisbury, England

July 13

Dear Alf :

The journey continues to be a great success. We had a little rest from
camping by spending a week here in Salisbury catching up on work and
letters-including finishing the first draft of Dodrwortb and doing some
revising on it; then had a week of touring in Dorset, Devon, and Corn
wall-glorious country. After a couple of days here again catching up,
we start for Wales.

We re becoming awfully keen to get home, and we spend large wide
hours talking about the possibilities of a farm in America. See you soon!

Ever,
SL

Cable from Paris Aug 17

Harbrace

New York City

May take four months finishing Dodsworth. Better not plan publish

before April Lewis

268 DODSWORTH

Lew md his wife, Dorothy Thompson Lewis, returned to the United
States August 28th. They stayed at the Harcourt house in Riverside, Con
necticut, -for a time, and after looking for a country place, they purchased
a joo-acre farm near Bmard, Vermont, where they stayed until early
November, while he continued his work on Dodsworth. Then they came
to New York and stayed at their apartment at 57 West Tenth Street.
There he finished the manuscript and delivered it to his publishers before
Christmas. About the middle of February 192$ the Lewises went to
Florida. All this while contact between Lewis and the office was in person
or by telephone.

TEN

The Nobel Prize

[1929]
February 18
Dear Red:

Here s another letter from Rowohlt persisting in true Continental
merchant fashion in his plea for a lower royalty on Dodrworth. I think
10% is not too much to ask. We made a concession on Mantrap because
that was somewhat out of line with your other novels. I would be inclined
to stand pat on our proposal. I wrote him ten days ago that we d have to
stick to 20% for serial & 10% for book. What he is offering now is 10%
on the paper bound books and the same number of pfennigs per copy on
the cloth bound books. We have noticed in recent royalty reports from
Germany that the sale of cloth bound books seems to be increasing there,
and of course it s better to have the royalty on the higher priced book.
If we hadn t made the concession on Mcmtrap, we wouldn t have had this
difficulty.

We just have your telegram that you are at Homosassa. I hope you
like- Florida and that you both catch big fish.

Ever yours,
Alf

The Lodge,
Horaosassa, Fla.
Feb. 21

Dear Alf :

Stick by the io/ for book and 20% for serial. If Rowohlt won t take
it, some one else will-though I d like to continue with him.

The fishing is fine, the weather glorious, and I m having a real rest,
though I am spending part of each day writing. We may stay away till

270 DODSWORTH

mid-March, looking in at Palm Beach and possibly even Havana. We ll be
here for about another week.

If you still have copies of the special edition of Dodsworth, I wish
you d send me one P.D.Q. Put down Cabell, Edith Wharton, and Louis
Bromfield on the list of people who ought to have copies -f or boosting.
Dodsworth ought to go to my Swede publishers as early as possible.

Try Middletown * and Love in Chicago 2 on the German publishers.

Luck!
SL

March 14
Dear Red:

L am glad to have an address for you, and I have just telegraphed
you: "Advance fifty thousand. Times Hansen Phelps highly favorable
Mencken disappointed Tribune stupid. Have ordered our best and heaviest
advertising so far. Outlook really fine." The advance of 50,000 is first-rate.
It means that we have been able to get the impression around generally
that Dodsworth 8 is a sure-fire big book. It s extraordinary how fast the
notion got around to the public that they didn t want The Man Who
Knew Coolidge. When you consider that we had sold 240,000 Gantry and
that we planted only 20,000 Man Who Knew Coolidge in advance of
publication, it is astonishing how few the public bought. It would almost
seem as if an unfavorable impression about that book spread from one end
of the country to the other inside of 24 hours. I mention this so you will
understand that a really favorable impression of Dodsworth has spread
throughout the book trade or we couldn t have an advance of 50,000.

Baker and Taylor ordered 10,000 and the News Company 10,000.
We can t expect re-orders until next week. They will begin to show up
by the time you get home, and we ll have some real indications then.
Meantime, all I can say is that everything looks fine, that the office en
thusiasm for the book is at fever heat, and because so many other people
here now have a hand in it, it is only fair for me to say that you re cer
tainly getting an enthusiastic publishing job.

I have to go West on a variety of errands about the first of April.
Let me know definitely when you ll be home so that we can have a real
visit before I leave.

Love to you both.

Yours,
Atf

1 By Robert S. and Helen Merrcll Lynd, HB&Co., 1929.

2 By Charles Walt, HB&Cp., 1929.

8 Harcourt s letter was written on publication day, March I4th.

[1929] 271

Hotel Ponce de Leon
St. Augustine, Florida
March 15
Dear Alf :

Many thanks for your wire, received yesterday. Dorothy had to go
to Pittsburgh to lecture she left yesterdaybut I m going to remain here
a week or ten days to finish a short story for Ray Long, then join her
in NY.

We ve had a grand vacation though on it each of us did a short
story and an article. We stayed at Homosassa for nearly two weeks, writ
ing part of the day but going out fishing for five or six hours daily, with
lunch cooked by our guide in some wild spot in the jungle; then we
bought a flivver which I m going to ship up to Vermont from here, as
an extra car for next summer-and believe me the new Ford is a marvelous
car, too and we motored from Homosassa to St. Petersburg, Tampa,
Winter Haven, Mountain Lake (where one of Edward Bok s millionaire
neighbors is a celebrated manufacturer of pink pills), Avon Park, Oke-
chobee, and Palm Beach, where we stayed about a week, with a jaunt
down to Miami. Then up here, where I shall play the sedulous hermit for
a week and return looking like Danl Boone.

If anything interesting happens, you can get me here by wire for
another week. See you soon.

Ever,
SL

Hugh Walpole and Francis Brett Young would probably be interested in
Dodsivorth. Jonathan ought to send em copies.

March 20

Dear Red:

I talked with Dorothy on the telephone yesterday. It is too early for
real re-orders on Dodswortb yet. I enclose proofs of a few of our latest
advertisements, from which you will see that F.P.A. likes it, and so does
Fanny Butcher. In fact, her review comes nearest to understanding what
it is all about than that of anyone else so far! We have spent or ordered
spent about $6000 in advertising at the moment and have as much more
scheduled through the next three or four weeks. The book is well dis
played everywhere around here, and in walking to the station last evening
I saw three people carrying copies-which is a darn good sign. I have
asked Jonathan to send copies to Walpole and Brett Young.

Yours,

Alf

272 DODSWORTH

In the next two months there was little correspondence between Lewis
and the office. Mrs. Lewis arrived in New York on or before March i$th,
and Lewis joined her at their Tenth Street apartment probably the end of
the month. Only one brief note was written to him there by the office in
mid-April. There is no indication as to the exact date they left for Twin
Farms.

Twin Farms
Barnard, Vermont
May 26

Dear Alf :

Will you please have another check for $1000 deposited to my
account at the Guaranty, and confirm the deposit to me, as soon as con
venient. . . . Carpenters bills, masons bills, all that, but Lord! what a
lovely place we re coming to have, and this second farmhouse of ours,
which we are modernizing to use as a guest house, is going to be even
lovelier than the present main house in which we live we may move over
to the other one when it s done. The whole place is even more beautiful
than I had remembered, with spring here. When are Ellen and you com
ing? . . . You head for Woodstock, and ask at the post office how to get
to Barnard; at Barnard, the general store, ask how to get here.

It seems to me that the three ringed portions in the enclosed corre
spondence from Hugh Walpole would make about as perfect an ad as
could be.

I ve been thinking more about the possibility of having Babbitt in the
Modern Library. That libraryand it seems to be improving steadily
reaches just the sort of people who would keep Babbitt alive; and I don t
think G & D (Grosset and Dunlap) do. Would it be possible to have it
BOTH G & D and the Modern Library?

I feel about one million per cent better up here than in New York.
Curiously, I don t get in the least lonely. Evenings we read and sneak off
to bed at 11, instead of one or two, And now I m going out and chop
some wood well, not much wood!

Ever,
SL

Will you please send me here a Gantry and four copies of Dodswortb.
I find that our otherwise admirably furnished residence lacks these neces
sities.

ALSO, did I tell you that Peggy Bacon wants to do an illustrated
edition of Babbitt? This might be a stunning success I see it on good

[1929] 273

paper, selling probably at five dollars. If we did this, we wouldn t, of
course, consider the Modern Library stunt, at least for a long time. I wish
you d talk this over with Peggy, if you see her. Jonathan writes me that
he is thinking of getting out a five shilling collected edition of my books.
It seems to me that we ought, with the Bacon-illustrated Babbitt as a
beginning, to think of something of the same sort. I believe we could get
more out of (at least) Main St., Babbitt & Arrowsmith, than we are now,
just leaving them to be buried among the Zane Grey books in the G & D
collections. Let s talk it over.

SL

May 29
Dear Red:

1 am pleased to be able to report that our advertising girl beat us both
to it on the Hugh Walpole comment on Dodswortb. When I went to her
about it, she showed me the enclosed proof.

It is fine to know that you re both well and happy in Vermont. It
must be lovely there, and I am looking forward to the time when I can
get away to see you and the place. I certainly can t leave till after Don
gets home about the middle of June. He reports much interesting bus
iness in London. He has made a telephone appointment with me for this
afternoon, the idea of which I find rather exciting.

If you look at the Peggy Bacon pictures in New Songs -for New
Voices x and particularly when you see those she s- done for Carl s Roota-
baga stories, 2 you will find, I think, that they lean too much on the side of
caricature to suit Babbitt. I like her pictures enormously; in fact, I bought
from her a dozen of the originals for New Voices to give to Ellen, who
is really responsible for that volume. Don t you think somebody like
Webster would do a better Babbitt than Peggy Bacon?

I am digging out just what Grosset and Dunlap have been doing with
the old books. I have some ideas of my own about a scheme for handling
all our cheap editions, which I think will ripen in the course of the year,
and which, if it does ripen, will interest you almost as much as it does us.
I ll save that to talk about when we meet.

I enclose some more proofs of recent advertisements of Dodsworth,
from which you will see that we have started the steamer gift campaign.
The book business generally is flat. Dodswortb, the new Vina Delmar

* Edited by Louis Untermeyer and David Mannes, HB&Co., 1928.

2 Carl Sandburg: Rootctbaga Country, HB&Co., 1929.

274 DODSWORTH

short stories, 1 and Strachey s Elizabeth and Essex seem to be about the
only books that are selling in the bookstores.

Yours,
Alf

During the next month, while Lewis was in Vermont, communication
between him and the office was by telephone.

June 25
Dear Red: ,

Did you get a letter from Jonathan dated May i3th on the subject of
a five shilling uniform edition of your books? Jonathan talked to me about
it in London, but I didn t commit myself, thinking we should all talk it
over when I got back. But meanwhile he wrote to you and sent me a
copy of the letter. I think the idea is a good one, and I have talked about
it with Alf, who thinks so too. It seems a good way to keep all the old
books going.

I had a pleasant and busy four and a half weeks in London. Georgian
House seemed a little dingier, but no less comfortable. It was three years
since I had been there.

I expect you re enjoying the farm. Love to you and to Dorothy.

Ever yours,
Don

July 3
Dear Don:

Welcome back! And welcome to Vermont if you ever get time to
come here. Yes, I had Jonathan s letter and agreed with him that it would
be a good thing to do the five shilling edition of my books. And what
about H.B.and Co. doing the same thing? As I have written Alf, I am not
at all satisfied with the way Grosset & Dunlap are handling my books.
It seems to me that they just let them ride along with a lot of Zane Grey
and detective stories. Yet there should be, in Main St and Babbitt, with
their incredible advertising value, a steady yearly sale of I don t know
how many tens of thousands.

Alf says G & D are boosting them in their special dollar series. Well,
I hear very little of this series in comparison with the Modern Library
and the Doubleday-Doran dollar series. And I note in the enclosed ads of
that series that not even one of my books is mentioned. We must make

1 Loose Ladies, 1929. All three books mentioned were published by Harcourt,
Brace.

[1929] 275

plans to see if we can t utilize the rep of these books better, maybe, eh?
This letter, of course, is equally for Alf and you.

Ever,
Red

July 10
Dear Red:

Your letter about cheap editions has been on my desk for a few days
because of the Fourth of July weekend and because I wanted to get some
figures from Grosset. Grosset does not publish your books in his Dollar
Library, a list of which you sent, but in his 75^ reprints. Your books
belong in the Dollar Library as regards distinction, but the Dollar Library
is carried only by regular bookstores, a few department stores, and a few
of the more important newsstands. Grosset has 30 salesmen on the road,
two-thirds of whom are visiting drugstores, newsstands, and places which
do not carry his Dollar Library or the Modern Library or the Doubleday
Doran "Star Dollar Books." It s his judgment, and I agree with him, that
your books are popular enough to profit by the wider distribution. He is
to take on Elmer Gantry in September and is going to try that in both his
Dollar Library and his 75 ^ Library. He is coupling with the 75^ edition
of Gantry a new campaign on Babbitt and Main Street with a series of
posters saying, in effect: "You all know Babbitt. You ve all said, She
comes from Main Street. 7 Read the books that gave these words their
meaning."

There is one aspect of all this which seems important to me. The
chief reason Grosset has extended his retail distribution and display ma
chinery so widely is that it is a settled part of his policy not to advertise
his cheap editions direct to the public. He thinks this would cut off his
supplies from publishers and authors, as it tends to foul the market for
the books at the higher prices. It might be said that you and we are lucky
to have sold so much of your market at $2.00 and $1.50 that there hasn t
been a great market left at 75^. I am dubious particularly about the adver
tising of books like Trader Horn, with its hint that the public was a fool
to buy such a book at $3.50 when if they had waited a while they could
get it for $1.00. 1 don t like the tendency. It may lead to American pub
lishing getting into the condition of British publishing, for their first pub
lication is often merely for reviewers, the circulating libraries, and a small
public, to earmark the book as important, with the real sale and real
publishing effort put on the three-and-six, the two-and-six, the two shil
ling, the one shilling and the ninepence editions. I d hate to have things
get to that condition here.

276 DODSWORTH

The reprint situation seems to me to be changing. I have some new
ideas about it up my sleeve, but they can t develop for a year or two.
Meantime, I don t like to get our machine sidetracked into selling cheap
books with a small return both for us and for the author.

Dodswonh keeps on. We sold 10,000 in June, and it s going at a little
better rate this month. Sales are just beyond 85,000 in this country. We
have been busy, and things are humming here. Some first-rate .novels have
shown up and a top-notch lot of non-fiction is on the carpet. The latter
includes Clemenceau s Memoirs, the third volume of Parrington, Geoffrey
Scott s Boswell, Pringle s Roosevelt,, and Lloyd Lewis s Sherman -which
would be hard to beat for next year.

We ll talk more about reprints when we meet. I am looking for the
chance to get up to see you.

Ever yours,
Atf

Barnard, Vermont
July 1 6
DearAlf:

Your letter about the Grosset situation is very complete and satis
factory, and obviously it will be well to go on, certainly for the present.
There s only one sale the Grosset system fails to get for me that prestige
sale which is more valuable, even in eventual sales, than the current figures
indicate.

Can t we, presently, handle this by getting out a collected edition of
my books to be handled by the regular bookstores? I see something at
about $1.75 a volume; I see us starting with Main Street, Babbitt, Arro<w-
smth, Gantry, and Dodsworth, then adding the minor items only if the
first plunge is a success. Keep this in mind, talk it over with Don and Gus,
and we ll discuss it when I see you.

All goes well though most placidly. The new house, which will have
cost me about $10,000 beyond the first purchase price, will be done in
about three weeks and, thank God, the huge expense will then cease.

1 Georges Clemenceau: Grandeur and Misery of Victory, 1930.

Vernon Louis Parrington: The Beginnings of Critical Realism in America, Vol
ume III of Main Currents in American Thought, was published October 1930, more
than a year after the author s death.

Geoffrey Scott was editing the Colonel Ralph Isham collection of Private Papers
of James Boswell from Malahide Castle and planned to write his own biography of
Boswell. When he died shortly after this, both tasks were unfinished.

Henry F. Pringle: Theodore Roosevelt, 1931.

Lloyd Lewis: Sherman: Fighting Prophet, 1932.

[1929] 277

It will be a wonderful guest house and could, if we ever wanted to, be
sold as a separate unit, leaving us this place and a couple of hundred acres.
It has the most splendid view but then I hope you ll be up here to see it
yourself.

I m returning the G & D posters etc. today. I think they make a
mistake in advertising Main St etc. just as they do Zane Grey in trying to
sell my books on a lowbrow basis when, actually, they have always sold
on just the opposite basis. I think they get that wrong slant from dealing
so much with the lowbrow books they publish and forget that even the
corner store on Main St does have a lot of school teacher and women s
club real or would-be highbrow buyers.

Well be here all summer except from August 5th to about August
joth, when I ll be at Middlebury College. When you get sick of the NY
smell, do come shooting up whenever you feel like it.

Ever,
SL

July 30
Dear Red:

I just had a nice visit with Ramon Guthrie. He seems to be wabbling
a little about his work, but I think he is back here in pretty good shape
and that some one of the books he has on the stocks is apt to fall into
order rather promptly. He says he is coming up to see you, and I think
it would be a grand thing for him. He is also talking of getting a teaching
job, which he can do without its taking much out of him, to take the
bread-and-butter worry off his neck while he gets a book or two into
shape. I think this is a good idea, and we are keeping our eyes open for
some connection. You might keep it on your mind while you are at
Middlebury. If you mention his name now and then, there is apt to be
someone there who knows of an opening.

Harcourt, Brace and Company celebrated the tenth anniversary of its
incorporation yesterday. It was too hot for anything but a very mild
celebration. Don and Gus and Joel came out to Riverside and had dinner
with Ellen and me, and we sat around and talked about our mistakes.

Ever yours,
Alf

Lewis made a hurried visit to New York after his session at Middlebury
College in Vermont and arranged to have Harcourt, Brace publish the
work of his yoimg frot6g, Fred Rothermell.

278 DODSWORTH

August 12
Dear Red:

We have been trying to close the office Saturdays while it is so hot
so I am just able today to send you the contracts for Rothermell s novels.
Of course we are glad to follow your judgment in a case of this sort.

More power to your elbow, which I hope had enough pleasant exer
cise to justify your visit to our metropolis during this hot term. The more
I think of the boy s story the more I like it.

Ever yours,
Alf

Barnard, Vermont
August 13
Dear Alf:

I enjoyed my brief bat in New York my only one in three months
but I enjoyed still more getting back to this lovely coolness and quiet.

I m enclosing the Rothermell contract, one copy, signed. He will be
sending you both mss, and then you can see which one you would like to
publish first and, if it prove to be Superman instead of Fifth Avenue, you
can just change name on the contract. He s revising both mss and I m
going over both of them again before he sends them.

I rather think that it will be Superman that you will want to publish
first, but we ll see. Meantime, as soon as he gets these two revised, he will
go back ,to a third novel, which he has half finished. Lord I envy him that
industry of 30!
Come on!

Ever,
SL

There were no letters for a period of three weeks, and at the end of the
summer Harcourt and his wife took a trip to New England and dropped
in to see Lewis at his farm.

Barnard, Vt.

September 7
Dear Alf:

Jimmie Sheean writes me from Palestine asking me to O.K. his
contract with you. 1 1 shall be glad to do this, if you will send it on.

1 Vincent Sheean: Qog and Magog, HB&Co., 1930.

[1929] 279

We want to see you and Ellen up here soon again, when we are not
swamped with other guests. We hardly had a moment for a real chin.

Cordially,
SL

Barnard, Vermont
September 16
Dear Alf :

Andre Siegfried l will be in New York soon indeed he may already
have arrived. He was here for a few days and told me of something that
might make a great book for you. His father, later a Senator of France,
came to America in about 1860. He became acquainted with Lincoln; was
an intimate of the White House; went there almost daily; talked with
cabinet members about the most crucial affairs. All this is related in
a diary which, I understand, Siegfried has and which has never been
published. Wouldn t it, with a proper (and not too short) preface by
his distinguished son, make a bully publishing item? Talk to Siegfried
about it.

And another idea. Is there today any really up-to-date Hoyle? I once
tried to find one and couldn t. There are plenty of books on bridge, but is
there any book giving, and properly, the new rules for all forms of bridge,
poker, roulette, chemin de f er, baccarat, all forms of rummy, etc. etc.?

I wish you would send me, roughly, the sale of Dodswonh to date,
and the approximate amount of money now due me from HB and Co.
I must begin to think about financing the writing of the new novel, which
is going to be Neighbor with the new slants created by the fact there ain t
no labor today in itself a dramatic thing: and I don t want, if I can help
it, to have to write at all for Ray Long 2 or any magazine while I m doing
it. Of course this year, with the rebuilding of the new house, I ve needed
a lot of current money. That s all paid for now or will be with the next
check, due me from Ray on October ist and next year there isn t a single
thing we need to do on the place though always, as you so well know,
there s endless things one agreeably can do.

If Ann ( Watkins) would only sell the Dodsivorth movie, even if she
only got $20,000 for it, that would amply take care of financing next year.
But as I don t want, under any considerations, to touch any of my sav-

1 Harcourt, Brace had published Siegfried s America Comes of Age in 1927.

2 By this time the name of Hearst s International Magazine had been changed to
Cosmopolitan Magazine, and Ray Long was still editor.

280 DODSWORTH

ings, if she doesn t sell it, I m afraid I may have to do a little magazine
work to get through.

It s gorgeous here now the autumn has just set in with days so fine
that I have to use Xian Science on myself to stay indoors before the type
writer. The trees have turned only a little, and from now on, unless we
hit a soggy rainy spell, it will be finer and finer, till about October 15.

Ever,
SL

September 19
Dear Red:

Thanks for your note of the i6th. I have heard from Andr6 Siegfried
and expect to see him tomorrow.

I ll get after Ann about the possibility of some motion picture income.
About your financial situation, your balance on the first of July has been
whittled down, by your withdrawals and by the $1000 a month to Grace,
to $10,619.00. Since the first of July, Dodsworth has earned $4000. This
does not account for royalties from England or translations. I should
guess there would be at least $5000 from those sources. I ll really stir
around about some motion picture money. I agree with you that it is too
bad to work for Ray Long when you re ready to get at a big job, I ll let
you know when anything develops.

Ever yours,
Aif

Barnard, Vermont
September 20th
Dear Alf :

Will you please send me another copy of Middletoim? I gave mine
to Andr6 Siegfried, who had never heard of the book and who was most
excited by it

Are we going to see you up here again before we leave on the 9th of
October? I am going to Toronto to the A. F. of L. Conference. Reason:
Neighbor. Dorothy and I were sorry to have seen you for such a very
short time and had hoped you would get up here again before we left.
The weather is lovely,

Ever-
SJL.

[1929] 281

September 23
Dear Red:

I had a nice visit with Siegfried Friday. He is coming out to Riverside
for the weekend after next.

We are exceedingly busy here, and I shan t be able to get up before
the pth of October. I am glad I did get the glimpse of you last month.
The autumn must be gorgeous in your little valley.

Ever yours,
Atf

October 3
Dear Mr. Lewis:

Sidney Williams of the Philadelphia Inquirer has asked us for articles
by some of our authors. He plans to run a series this winter on the subject
of "Why People Should Own and Read Books." It would be limited to
about 200 words and run in a box with a cut of the author s portrait. If
you aren t too busy would you be willing to write such an article for him?
How about writing me a line or two about what you are doing, your
plans, etc. I am flooded with questions as to what you will do next and
what you are writing now. I hear you are going to Toronto soon. Is that
right?

Please give my best to Mrs. Lewis.

Sincerely,
John D. Chase x

Barnard, Vermont
October 15
Dear Denny:

No, I won t write 200 words for Sidney Williams. What in the deuce
could anyone say on such a silly question? Norman Hapgood has taken a
whole book to answer a far more limited question: Why Janet (or any
one) should read Shakspere. 2 A good book, but it won t influence the
Janets, I am afraid. Tell Mr. Williams to run the Borzoi ads, and tell the
public that one should read books because the Russian aristocracy do or
carry em anyhow.

I am beginning a novel with American labor as the scene, but inas
much as the thing looks enormous and the task so vast as to be discour
aging, I may never finish it, so let s not say anything about it. I am going

1 Chase was then publicity director of Harcourt, Brace.

2 Why Janet Should Read Shakespere, Century, 1929.

282 DODSWORTH

to Toronto and I went to the Marion cotton mills, but two trips don t
make this novel

If the world yearns for news, tell it I am staying in these Vermont
hills until the snow drives me out by threatening to barricade me in, I am
writing short stories-or have been-just to keep my hand in until I get up
energy to begin this new novel. I am reading innumerable books on the
labor movement in the United States, in between visiting the local rotary
clubs-because I want to know Vermont, the first place I have ever had a
real home in. I am also overseeing my wife overseeing the gardener plant
delphiniums.

Sincerely,

SL

Get acquainted with Fred Rothermell, whose jth Ave. you are to publish
& who goes to N.Y. to see the firm tomorrow.

October 25
Dear Mr. Lewis:

Thanks for your note. We re always glad to have any news about
you that we can use. Every now and then I get a request for an article
from you. Do you want me to refuse these for you or send them along to
you? Here is another

In getting up a free lance feature article on the question as to whether the
successful business man can retire before old age or ill health forces it, and
work out a satisfactory existence, I would like a comment from Sinclair Lewis.
As the author of Dodsivorth he certainly is, of course, one of the profound
observers of the retired business man here and in Europe.

In Mr. Lewis opinion, would Dodsworth, having felt restkss before
retirement, be apt to have developed and found himself in his old routine and
tracks? What would have been the effect of keeping in harness, after it seemed
irksome and empty? Would not his friendship and tastes, the pattern of his
life have remained more fixed and satisfactory? What effect on his marriage?
Likely to remain intact although empty?

This article is to be written for the New York World or the Sunday
Magazine Section of the Herald Tribune. If these things are merely a
nuisance send me a blanket refusal and we ll be hardboiled.

Sincerely,
John D. Chase

[1929] 283

Barnard, Vermont
October 26
Dear Denny:

If anybody wants an article from me and wants to pay 75 cents a
word, I may, and may not, be interested. But, being a professional writer
who has to earn his living thus, one of the things I most ain t interested in
is writing other people s articles for them. If the gentleman wants to know
Mr. Lewis s opinion about what Mr. Dodsworth would do, he might read
the book. Yes, please be hardboiled with all these requests.

It s gorgeous here now, even though most of the leaves are gone.
There s a spaciousness about the hills that s somehow exciting. I m going
to stay on for another week or ten days.

Ever,
SL

Barnard, Vermont
October 26
Dear Alf :

I think the royalty statement sent out October 25th is in error about
Dodsworth I haven t the Dodsworth contract here it is in New York
but as I remember it, on this contract we did not have the former arrange
ment of 10% to 50,000. If so, there should be another $6250 on my
balance.

Your seeing Fred Rothermell and his getting acquainted with Ray
mond and Helen Everitt x have been fine for him. It starts him going at
an accelerated pace. I think you ll have something superb there, with
another two or three years of training.

Have you been able to start anything about the Dodsworth movie?
I hope not to have to do a bit of hackwriting next year. After seeing the
Marion strike, and spending a few days at the American Federation of
Labor convention, I m keener about this novel than anything since Arrow-
smith* And at the A F of L convention I met exactly the right man for
the De Kruif-Birkhead of my novel Carl Haessler of the Federated Press;
college man, Rhodes scholar at Oxford, imprisoned as conscientious obj
during the war, ever since up to his ears in the labor movement; sense of
humor; delightful to work with; eager to do the job. He is to join me
here, and we ll go snooping about the country together.

Dorothy had to start out lecturing three days ago, but the snow has
not come yet, and I m going to stay here (with the Rothermells, who are

1 C. R. Everitt was an editor at Harcourt, Brace.

284 DODSWORTH

to have the house for the winter, and with Carl and a temporary cook)
until the roads get bad, making plans for the novel so that we won t waste
motion when we start out. I hope to have the novel (which will be longer
than the new edition of the Encyc Britannica) finished a year from now,
ready for publication (naturally, as The Big Book of the Season) in early
spring 1931 just when labor is busting loose again and raising hell.

Shouldn t Cape be making a report on Dodsworth sales in England?
There doesn t seem to be any on the royalty statement.

I wish you could slip up here for a few days it s even more restful
than in summer. But probably about the time you hit the Vermont
border, you d be riding into a blizzard!

Ever,
SL

October 29
Dear Red:

I have yours of the 2 6th. The royalty statement on Dodsworth is
right. I am afraid you have it confused with Neighbor. I enclose a sum
mary of advertising through September. Of course, you can have the
details for each month if you want them. We just have Cape s royalty re
port for sales last spring, too late, of course, to get into this account. The
earnings on your books are ^954-

I m delighted that you re settling down to the new novel and that
you re staying in Vermont doing the ground work. It sounds fine about
Carl Haessler.

We had a good session with Rothermell. That s going to be all to the
good.

I can t get a smell of interest in a Dodsworth movie, although I have
put out feelers in a number of directions. I am hoping to see Laurence
Stallings before the first of the year, and maybe I can work it round that
way.

Ever yours,
Atf

Barnard, Vermont
Nov. 5
Dear Don:

Sorry to have to bother you with making the investments for me the
other day but otherwise I would never have got in on the bargain stocks
as I hope they will prove to be!

[1929] 285

I ll be here about two more days, and arrive in NY about the i5th,
with Boston and Rhode Island for about a week in between.

Ever,
SL

The Lewises spent part of the winter in New York, at their apartment at
37 West Tenth Street. In January they headed for California, stopping off
at Reno, where Lewis successfully petitioned for a more equitable method
of paying the agreed alimony to his former wife.

[1930]
February 6
Dear Red:

I am just back from a grand fishing trip in Florida, and Melville tells
me the news of the outcome of the Nevada business. I hope you and
Dorothy are both fine and getting along comfortably with your mutual
pregnancies.

This note is to say that if you find yourself in or near Hollywood,
Vina Delmar is in Beverly Hills. She is quite a person. She d like to meet
you, and I think you d enjoy each other.

Ever yours,
Alf

Monterey, Calif.
Feb. 15
Dear Alf:

I m glad you had a good fishing-trip in Florida, but that state is a
blinking swamp compared with this one-and-only earthly edition of para
dise. I re-realize that, showing California to Dorothy, who had never been
farther west than Kansas City.

The ordeal in Reno was considerable; I was on the witness stand
through morning, afternoon, and evening. But I had an admirable lawyer,
and the Judge was at once just and sympathetic.

We ve taken a house here in Monterey for two months, during
which I expect to have the labor novel pretty clearly formed in rny mind.
It s a charming old Spanish house with a walled garden, in which we sit,
among spring flowers, while you have the joys of rain and snow and fog.
Dorothy feels fine and is taking it easy.

I ll put Vina Delmar s address in my address book, and if we get to
Hollywoodwhich is by no means certain we ll shout for her. Ida Brace

286 DODSWORTH

called up yesterday from San Francisco. She may come down here, and
if she does, we ll hope to have some good parties.

Ever,
SL

Dear Alf : I ve turned patriot and am rooting in the best Californiac man
ner. Feeling grand. DT

February 20
Dear Red:

Grand to have your note of the i5th from Monterey! Melville had
told me about the Reno modification. It s too bad to have had the worry.

You ll like Monterey. I think the curve of the bay and the ride over
the hill to Carmel are quite lovely. Good golf course, too, if you want to
start that. I suppose you know Lincoln Steffens? He is just finishing his
autobiography x for us, and his wife, Ella Winter, is a great girl

I am glad the plan for the labor novel is rounding out. I can imagine
a little how you hate to take the plunge into the deep water of such a job
as that, but I guess you can t help itand that s fine. It needn t be too
damned all-inclusive.

Love to you both!

Ever yours,
Alf

Monterey, Calif.
February 24
Dear Alf:

We like Monterey a lot find it better to live in than Carmel, because
the latter is so arty, and when we want the sea, it s only a few minutes
over by motor. (I bought a second-hand car in San Francisco, and when
we get ready to leave, we ll sell it, possibly driving as far as Los Angeles
first.) We have a small but comfortable old house, with a beautiful gar
den, into which I wander a dozen times a day. It s like June here, now,
and has been ever since we got here with snow and below zero in NY.

We ve seen Steffens and Ella Winter a number of times had them
here for dinner a few nights ago. But the people we see most of are
Gouverneur and Mrs. Morris. He s a corker. I m trying to get him to
think of doing as only he and Edith Wharton could a sort of Forsyte
Saga of American High Society, from the simple Bar Harbor days of

1 The Autobiography of Lincoln Steffens, 1931.

[1930] 287

cutunder buggies and the polka, to these days of gin and racing cars with
the names dominating American society in 1 890 almost entirely replaced
by new ones. He could do it, too, though most of his life he has written
only rather light stories. But he knows, and he can write. If I persuade
him, I may get us a first look at it, without binding either side.

Ask Paul if he has been looking into this Coffey-Humber cancer cure
stuff. It sounds important to me. Might repay him to make a trip out here
to look into it. And he would see the Jacques Loeb Marine Laboratory
here. I wish he d come.

Anything stirring on Fifth Avenue (Fred Rothermeirs book, not that
horrible thoroughfare) and any news of his new novel? He could prob
ably use another $250 advance most handsomely by about now I know
he had just enough to scrape through till spring.

Ever,
SL

Ever have a chance to talk to Stallings about a Dodsworth movie-or play
and movie?

March i
Dear Red:

I get a good deal of pleasure out of the comfort and fun you both
seem to be having in Monterey. What you say about Gouverneur Morris
is really interesting. He certainly can write and if he would do a Forsyte
Saga of American High Society, it might be a grand book. It might even
be non-fiction if you and he could think of some theme to hold the
material. The idea interests me a good deal. Do try to get it earmarked
for us.

Paul and Rhea are fine, but he is headed for Europe this summer,
leaving about the first of May for five or six months, to look into several
matters there which will be grist for his articles as well as for the next
book.

Fifth Avenue hasn t shown any real signs of life. I have never seen
the fiction market so congested or the trade book business so poor, aside
from a few titles. Alec Grosset told me last night that their January bus
iness was only a little more than half of what it was a year ago. The stores
were left with a great lot of undigested stock the first of the year, and
the whole trade seems to be selling plugs and overstock. It will take all
spring for things to straighten out. You re lucky not to have a new book
ready just now. I haven t seen Stallings in almost a year. Helen * is in New

1 Stallings s wife.

288 DODSWORTH

York just now and is going to have lunch with me next week. Laurence
is still in Hollywood and will be, I think, until about the first of April.

Ever yours,
Atf

Monterey, Calif.
March iz
Dear Alf:

I doubt if Gouverneur Morris will ever really settle down and do the
Amerif orsyte book. He thinks of it, but he says he would need a complete
free year and as I imagine he spends 50,000 a year, there would be no
question of an advance being of any significance in this case.

You didn t say whether you had been moved to send Fred Rothermell
a voluntary $250 advance. I imagine it would mean more to them now
than a thousand at any time later. I d be glad to send it to them, but they
won t take it too prouda fine and too rare quality in a young author.
I hear from him that he has completed the astronomer novel. Has he sent
it in?

I ve seen McNamara, Mooney, and Schmitt in San Quentin Dorothy
and I went to San Francisco for a weekand had a good talk with them.
If one % of people out of prison were as fine and interesting as they, life
would be more worth while.

Ever,
SL

The Lewises returned to New York during April, and after a brief stay at
their Tenth Street apartment, went up to Twin Farms. Mrs. Lewis, who
was expecting a child) returned to New York early in May to be near her
doctor, Lewis stayed on in Vermont until the end of May.

May 19
Dear Red:

I have a note from Will White about a novel I sent him, in which
he says: "Remember me affectionately to Red Lewis, who is the best
all-around, single-handed, catch-as-catch-can, no-holds-barred, Greeco-
Roman writing man that the American Continent has produced, willing
to meet all comers. Elmer Gantry fouled him but he knocked out all the
rest, God bless him."

Ever yours,
Alf

[1930] 289

37 West loth Street,
New York, June 14
Dear J.E.S.:

Thank you for the memorandum. I enclose my answer to the Grande
Revue.

SL

[Enclosure}

New York, June 13
M. Georges Roth
Paris iyme
Dear Sir:

In answering the questionnaire submitted by you on behalf of La
Grande Revue, I am afraid that I cannot commit myself to any cult of
letters or school of literary aesthetics, whether it call itself "populism,"
"humanism" (a movement which has achieved a certain popularity, re
cently, in America, and which appears to be in some ways the antithesis
of the tendency which you represent), or anti-humanism because the
opponents of humanism threaten, also, to become a cult. It is my convic
tion that art fulfills itself in many ways "lest one good custom should
corrupt the world."

The fact that in my own work I have perhaps, up until now, met
with the populist demand to concentrate on depicting the popular classes
of the nation, in terms, largely, of behavior, does not encourage me to
elevate my own interests, or way of looking at life, into a rule for all
novelists. I could not, for instance, write like Mr. Aldous Huxley, nor of
Mr. Huxley s characters, but I find that Point Counterpoint is an admir
able novel. And although I am inclined to think, with you, that contem
porary novelists have become excessive in psychological analysis, some
times to the sacrifice of all form, I bow my head to Mr. Joyce in his
greater moments, and am deeply grateful for the work of Virginia Woolf .

Nor do I think that the peculiar preoccupations of many of our
younger writers are due to any conscious literary movement, but are
rather symptomatic of the times in which we live, and will change with
the times. I do not believe that literary movements are made by organized
will, by literary cliques, but are made by life itself, and by men of genius.

Certainly the world is flooded at present with bad novels, but I am
inclined to blame for this, not the choice of material with which the
authors deal, nor their departure from accepted artistic forms, but rather
democracy which has made the masses articulate and the plethora of pub-

290 DODSWORTH

lishers who encourage everyone, including the ungifted and unillumined,
to express himself.

Sincerely yours,
Sinclair Lewis

Following the birth of their son Michael in New York the end of June,
the Lewises returned to Twin Farms. The correspondence that ensued
dealt mainly with translation rights of Lewis s work.

August i
Dear Red:

You never sent me your suggestions for editors for a five shilling
edition of your novels. If you want us to go ahead with this, I wish you
would let me have your suggestions because we might as well try first to
get just the people you would prefer.

What do you think of the current gyrations in publishing George
Doran going to Hearst and Liveright going to Hollywood? I suppose
more significant than either of these is Baker and Taylor s statement to
Gus yesterday afternoon that this July s business was the worst in their
experience. I am happy to say that our textbook department took up the
slack. Of course things are apt to look worst just before they begin to get
better. There may be nothing to the general impression that business will
improve in the autumn. If it doesn t, I have a notion we may be in for at
least two lean years. If so, we should perhaps wait until conditions are
definitely better to do the five shilling edition.

I think the whole situation will be clear by a year from now, and if
there were a new novel from you for a year from this autumn, it would
pretty surely be "the good five cent cigar the country needs."

Ever yours,
Alt

So. Pomfret, Vt.
August 6
DearAlf:

First, about the possible introductions to the library set of my books.
I am enclosing an elaborate list of possibilities. If and when we decide to
do this, I think Dorothy would be an admirable person to handle the
approach to these people-especially the Germans, French and English,
and if she handled these, she d have to handle the Americans too, to avoid
crossed wires. I don t suppose the set would be published before autumn
1931, so there is no hurry. If you decide on it, let her knowshe s keen

[1930] 291

to do it and let her know how much you would be willing to pay these
introducers.

Second, after months of thinking, it seems to me more important to
make this a really fine edition say $3.00 or $3.50 a volume, or even more
-rather than a five shilling edition like Jonathan s. The cheap edition can,
however, come later, if this goes over. In the first place, people who want
to pay only $1.25 will get these in the Grosset and Dunlap edition or
secondhand. Second, the people who are really interested in sets, in mak
ing and preserving a library, are most of them willing to pay enough to
get fine books on paper that will last. Third, with such an edition, we
need be in no hurry selling it take five years if necessary, perhaps adding
a volume or two and in the end get the money back with a good profit
AND have the prestige.

About the Russian business: Herewith carbon of a letter I am sending
to the Gosizdat State Publishing House.

It s been consistently cool up here while youVe had such hellish
weather, and all of us feel splendid.

Ever,
SL

[Enclosure]

South Pomfret, Vermont
August 7

To the State Publishing House
Moscow, U.S.S.R.
Dear Sirs:

Months ago I received the enclosed letter from you, suggesting that
with my next novel, I send you advance proofs so that you could publish
it simultaneously with America. But as you will see by the letter itself,
the signature and part of the letter had been torn off before I received it
whether by accident or by some postoffice censor I do not know. I have
been waiting, expecting another letter, but as it has not come, I shall
answer as best I can, and hope that this letter will be delivered to the
proper official.

The Gosizdat is in error in understanding that I am writing about the
class-struggle of California textile workers. In the first place, there are no
textile workers in California; in the second place I am not writing about
either California or textile workers. As a matter of fact I do not know just
exactly what I shall next write about. But when I do finish my next novel,
I shall be glad to have my publishers send you proofs well in advance of
our publication here, and I understand that I shall then be paid royalties.

2 9 2 DODSWORTH

But meantime, I wish to inquire about royalties on the many books of
mine which you have already published. When I was in Moscow in the
autumn of 1927, 1 received word from the Gosizdat that you would be
glad to pay royalties on these books. I also, without success, tried to ar
range a non-official convention between the Gosizdat and the American
publishers whereby Russian authors would receive royalties for their
books published in America. I have heard nothing more of either of these
projects. As I said, I should be glad to send you advance copies of not
only my next but all future novels, but in the meantime, I should be glad
to receive royalties on the already published novels which are, as I under
stand it, not classed in Russia as bourgeois novels but as more or less
revolutionary in their final eff ect.

Yours sincerely,
Sinclair Lewis

8/7-Later
DearAlf:

How roughly does my royalty account stand now? Have I anything
coming? What happened to Liveright & Doran?

Ever,
SL

August n
Dear Red:

Thanks for your letter of August 6th. Credit in your royalty account
to June 30th is $866,00.

There are lots of rumors about George Doran. I think the truth of
the matter is that he and Nelson Doubleday couldn t get along together,
so Nelson broke the arrangement. I guess Liveright s business is in a pre
carious condition. It was on the verge of being sold to Coward-McCann,
but that fell through. There are all sorts of negotiations and rumors going
on about it. Liveright is going, or has just gone, to Hollywood to work
for Paramount-Publix.

Don t quote me as authority for this diagnosis. I think it is pretty
nearly the truth. I know it is true that four or five other publishing houses
would welcome being merged or bought. Our trade business is very slack,
but the textbook business is going along beautifully.

Yours,
Alf

[1930] 293

Barnard, Vermont

8/13
Dear Alf :

I don t think very much of most of my short stories. Hence, while it
might be all right to have them published in France after they ve had not
one but several of my novels, I think that now, as introduction, they d be
bad. The same applies to our publishing here a volume of short stories.
The critics laying for me would have too good a chance. But I do think
that when we do the set, we might have one volume of short stories in it
to give variety & interest.

I also have your letter of Aug. n, about $866 on hand. I may grab
this off you to help meet Sept. % of income tax, but I m not sure.

Ever,
SL

August 19
Dear Red:

Don is just back from a holiday and I have waited for his return to
discuss yours of the sixth about a collected edition and possible editors.
Before we get into that, I note what you say about publishing your short
stories. I haven t read any of them in a long time. There are two or three
I remember vividly, but maybe there are not enough top-notchers to
make a book.

We can t see a library set of your books nowthat is, at $3.00 or
$3.50 a volume. I was talking with Alfred Knopf a few days ago, and he
said he d come to the conclusion that modern life has in a way spoiled the
best part of the publishers or authors market; that the really bookish
people who used to buy collected editions of standard works have their
houses full of them; that as he went round and saw such people, not only
were the bookcases full, but the tables and the book racks in the guest
rooms and the whole place. We were talking, as a matter of fact, about
starting a campaign to get people to weed out inconsequential books and
send them to libraries and such. If you take that situation in a time when
people feel poor, it would be almost impossible either to get the book
sellers to stock or the public to buy a handsome edition. We couldn t ask
$3.00 or $3.50 for a book printed from the original plates, even with an
introduction.

About what we call for the sake of definition the $1.25 set to be
printed on good thinner paper and bound nicely, looking a good deal like
the Cape edition but with introductions, we are ready to do that when
ever you are ready. I suppose it would be a bad time to try it just now,

294 DODSWORTH

but business certainly ought to be better by the time we could get the
books ready.

If Dorothy will handle getting the introductions, that will be fine.
She would be good at it from every point of view. We d be glad to pay
her $50 a volume for getting the introductions, and the fee for the intro
duction itself ought to run from $100 to ^50.

Will you consider all this and let me know what you think?

Yours,
Atf

Barnard, Vermont
Aug. 21
Dear Don:

Alf writes me that I have a balance mit you of about f 866. Will you
please deposit this to my account at the Guaranty Trust & let me know?
God will bless you.

Dorothy & Mike (and the father) are corking. Is there any chance
that Ida & you will be motoring this way before October ist? Then we
go off to Yurrop.

Ever,
Red

Barnard, Vermont
8/21
Dear Alf:

Dorothy or I will write you about the set in a day or two all rite,
$1.25 edition, not $3 publish, I slid think, fall of 1931, with maybe novel
spring 1932. Re short stories, see 2 of the best I ve ever written "Noble
Experiment" in August & "Bongo" in September Cosmopolitan. I really
think we mite do a volume of these in the set.
Come on up here! It s lovely now*

Ever,
SL

September 6
Dear Red:

We have received a report and check from Ernst Rowohlt Their
remittance of 14,375.65 Marks comes to $3417.09. Your share of this re-

[1930] 295

mittance is 13103.12. We are depositing this amount to your account at
the Guaranty today.

Ever yours,
Don

Barnard Vt Sep 9
Telegram to

Donald Brace

New York

Has Rowohlt check for three thousand been deposited yet. Please wire as

I wish to draw against it.

Sinclair Lewis

September 22
Dear Red:

The following is a translation of a cablegram we have just received
from Rowohlt:

We request you to withdraw by cable the posted check. Charge any
expense to our account. We are cabling you September 25th 5000, September
ipth 5000 and balance on October first. Settlement in this form unfortunately
required on account of non-receipt of substantial amounts because of economic
and political condition.

Don and I have decided that we have no choice but to do as he requests,
as there is no advantage in having his check thrown back on our bank and
he promises to cable the money. Since Dorothy is going abroad, perhaps
she can straighten this thing out. We could both give her power of
attorney to act for us in regard to your German rights.

Ever yours,
Alf

September 26
Dear Alf:

I m disturbed about Rowohlt s capers though probably there is a
little something on his side in that general financial conditions seem to be
very bad in Germany just now. I think your idea of having Dorothy look
into the whole matter, with power of attorney from both of us, is excel
lent. It may be that she will find out that Rowohlt is doing as well as the
rest. Has the cable of the 25th, with 5000 M. come in yet? Needless to

296 DODSWORTH

say, if you get stuck on this I ll pay back to you all you paid me as my
share, but give me a few weeks on this, as otherwise I ll have to sell some

stocks.

Us Vermont farmers certainly have our troubles, don t we. Why
don t we go into authorship which is, I am informed, a trade singularly
free of all financial and other complications-authors think not about taxes
but only about cloudlets, adultery, rose-buds, the laughing hands of Little
Ones. Do you know of a good school for learning authorship?

Ever,
SL

Barnard, Vermont
October 10

Dear Alf :

Dorothy and I sneaked off for three days to Montreal and had a
bottle of champagne and a black duck. Dorothy won t be going to Ger
many till about January ist. She ll go down to Westport (I think I ve
written you that we take F.P.A. s house for the winter) next Tuesday-
October 1 4th; but Fll stay here a week or ten days longer to get the house

closed up.

Ever,
SL

On November fifth the news broke that Lewis was awarded the Nobel
Prize. He was at Westport when he received the announcement and he
came down immediately to the office where reporters and newsreel people
were present at a public interview.

Lewis s statement to the press:

I feel the highest honor and gratification at being the first American
to be awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature, and I am accepting it with
pleasure, Until this morning, when the press associations telephoned to
me, I had no notion even that I was being considered. In the few hours
since then, I have several times been asked two questions by telephone*
The first is what I intend to do with the prize. My answer is that I shall
use it to support a well-known young American author and his family,
and to enable him to continue writing. The second question regards my
refusal of the Pulitzer Prize in 1926 and acceptance of the Nobel Prize in

I93 * - ^u

The reason is the enormous difference between the two prizes. The

[1930] 297

Nobel Prize is an international prize with no strings tied. It is awarded on
the basis of excellence of work. In the terms of the will of Mr. Nobel, the
prize was to be awarded for "the most distinguished work of an idealistic
tendency," which has come to be interpreted by the Swedish Academy,
which has the award of the prize, as merely meaning that such work shall
not be simply a commercial and machine-like production reaching vast
popularity. The Pulitzer Prize, on the other hand, is cramped by the pro
vision of Mr. Pulitzer s will that the prize shall be given "f or the American
novel published during the year which shall best present the wholesome
atmosphere of American life, and the highest standard of American man
ners and manhood." This suggests not actual literary merit, but an obedi
ence to whatever code of good form may chance to be popular at the
moment. As a result of this, the Pulitzer Prize has been given to some
merely mediocre novels along with other admirable novels. It is sufficient
criticism of the prize to say that in the last few years it has not been
awarded to CabelPs Jurgen, Dreiser s An American Tragedy, Heming
way s A Farewell to Arms, Wolfe s Look Homeward, Angel, or Cather s
A Lost Lady,

Another trouble with the Pulitzer Prize is that whereas the winner of
the Nobel Prize is chosen on the basis of his entire work up to the time of
the award, the Pulitzer Prize is supposed to be given for the best novel
appearing during a single year. Consequently in one year the committee
may have to choose between four or five first-rate novels, and the next
year between four or five third-rate novels. I am bringing in this matter
of the Pulitzer Prize only because I am being asked regarding it. Were it
possible, I should say nothing whatever except that I am extremely proud
to have been awarded the Nobel Prize.

November 5

His Excellency Wollmann F. Bostrom
Swedish Embassy
Washington D C

I have great honor and pleasure in accepting the Nobel Prize in Literature
and I shall be happy to go to Stockholm to receive the prize on December
tenth. Will you please express to the Swedish Academy my profound

gratification.

Sinclair Lewis

There was division of feeling when the Nobel award was announced,
especially as it was the -first time the Literature prize had been given to an
American writer. Lewis was feted on the one hand and criticized on the

298 DODSWORTH

other. He and Mrs. Lewis sailed for Stockholm on the Drottningholm late
in November.

Radio from SS Drottningholm Dec 5
Harbrace
New York
Please mail advertisements Grand Hotel Stockholm

Lewis

Cable from Stockholm Dec 10
Harbrace
New York

Have you arranged for publication full text my address Nobel Committee
next Friday. If so where when. Otherwise please try get Sunday sections
Times or Herald Tribune. Speech as it will be reported press certain cause
repercussions and very important exact text appears somewhere America.
About four thousand words. Wire me Grand Hotel where send.

Sinclair Lewis

December 10
Cable to
Sinclair Lewis
Grand Hotel
Stockholm

Times wants full text. Is cabling you direct. Mail me copy. We are
proudly thinking of you.

Alfred

December 13
Cable to
Sinclair Lewis
Grand Hotel
Stockholm

Warmest congratulations splendid speech. One column first page Times
full text page twelve.

Alfdon

Lewis, always a controversial figure, contimied the tradition in his accept
ance speech, the New York Times headlining it, ^Sinclair Lewis hits old

[1930] 299

school writers, champions new." He denounced academicism md lauded
the work of Theodore Dreiser, Sherwood Anderson, Eugene O Neill, and
Willa Gather, my one of whom he felt could have been chosen. The artist
was isolated and creative work belittled in the United States, he said, while
universities still lived in the dead past.

[1931]

c/o Guaranty Trust Co.,
London
January 21
Dear Alfred:

I am actually writing this in Berlin, but as I shall go to London in a
week, to remain there for two months, possibly, I give the address above.

Thank you (at this rather late date, which is the first on which I have
had time to write letters) for your prompt attention to the Stockholm
speech, and for your cable.

Stockholm went off very well. It was, of course, an ordeal, but the
members of the Academy and Mr. Laurin did everything to make our
stay pleasant and to protect us from whatever public events were not
absolutely necessary. Naturally our trip was somewhat depressed by
Dorothy s illness,

Her condition was evidently one which has been developing for some
time, and her terrific seasickness on the voyage over, the attack of high
fever in Stockholm, which kept her in bed during more than half of our
stay there, these were really preliminary to the sudden attack of appendi
citis which resulted in the operation entirely successful in Berlin. The
result has been that I have spent about half my time since I left America
by her bedside; and we have just returned here from ten days of living
remote from the world of telephones and interviewers, in the wooded
Thuringian mountains.

This enforced quiet has given me a chance to think, coolly and ob
jectively, about matters which have been bothering me for a long time.
I would have spoken to you about them before we left America, but the
opportunities for undisturbed discussion were so few and so brief and,
perhaps more important, my own mind wasn t then fully made up.

It comes down to this. I have the impression, and the impression is
backed up by too many facts to be merely fanciful, that the firm of Har-
court, Brace and Co., and you personally, feel that they have just about
done their duty by Sinclair Lewis. And I feel that I have just about done
my duty by Harcourt, Brace and Co. I am sure that you have for some
time known how I feel My outburst to you at lunch at my flat last spring

300 DODSWORTH

was a sign of it. If I hadn t felt so tied to the firm, by the fact that we all
began our careers together, I would have been more definite then, though
also, probably, more polite.

My feeling of that time has greatly increased in the last months, and
especially since the award of the Nobel Prize. To put it brutally, I feel
that the firm let me down, let my books down, in regard to the prize
award. It seems to me that you failed to revive the sale of my books as
you might have and that, aside from this commercial aspect, you let me
down as an author by not getting over to the people of the United States
the way in which the rest of the world greeted the award. It would have
meant the expenditure of considerable money on your part to have done
this, but never in history has an American publisher had such a chance.

I think, to take only one example, that it is unfortunate that you
should have permitted the readers of Heywood Broun s column to suppose
that his supercilious words on the subject were representative. You have
had in your hands, or you could have procured, material from the whole
world: Arnold Zweig s brilliant essay, for instance, spoken on the radio
in Berlin and then published in the German Literatur; the comment of
L Europe Nouvelle in France; essays in Das Tagebuch in Germany; Dr.
Karlfeldt s analysis of my work before the huge and distinguished crowd
at the formal prize giving, with all the royalty there; and many others in
a dozen countries. You might, by advertising, have counteracted such
editorials as the one in the New York Times. A few cables abroad would
have placed all this material at your disposal.

Just before I sailed, in the few minutes conversation at our house,
I turned over to you the interesting and important Swedish and German
clippings which I already had, and you agreed (or so I understood it) to
place some full-page advertisements simultaneously with the actual giving
of the prize in Stockholm. As far as I have been able to discover, you have
done absolutely nothing with this. And when in the January number of
the American Mercury you do mention me and the prize by a curt notice
down in a corner, it is as though the prize were a useful comment by a
third-rate critic.

In Europe, Dodsworth and several of the other novels have had an
enormous stimulation by reason of the prize. Even in the tiny village of
Oberhof, in the Thuringian forest, from which we have just returned, in
the one little bookstore there were postersyes, plural about me and a
lot of copies of Dods*worth and Babbitt. All over Europe the award was
used as a basis for Christmas advertising: "The book to give for Christmas
this year is the latest novel by this year s Nobel Prize winner,"

It comes down to this: If you haven t used this opportunity to push

[1931] 301

my books energetically and to support my prestige intelligently, you
never will do so, because I can never give you again such a moment.

There are all sorts of other things that have distressed me. At lunch,
just after the award, you said that you would immediately reprint and
advertise another edition of all my books, uniform but without intro
ductions. 1 If you have done so, I have seen no signs of it. The Grosset and
Dunlap editions, burying my books among those of Zane Grey and Gene
Stratton Porter and paying me only five cents a copy, have reaped what
ever reward there was in the prize.

But there s no good going over all these matters. I m sure you will
agree with me that the most important thing in any business relationship
is mutual confidence. I think that element no longer exists with uson
either side. And for me this lack of confidence is most important, because
it is keeping me from starting work on a new novel. I haven t made this
decision under the influence of any other publisher whatever. I have had
offers, but I have refused even to consider them.

Our parting is complicated by many things, one of the most impor
tant of which is that you have a contract for my next book unnamed.
But I recall having heard you say many times that you would never try
to hold an author who did not wish to be held. Also, this contract I volun
teered to make, at the time when Harrison Smith left you, 2 and I did it to
protect you and the firm from the many rumors that I was leaving you
and going with him. I am asking you to be as generous as I was then, and
to send me back the contract, cancelled.

Please believe me that it has cost me weeks of thinking and worry to
plan and write this letter. If we had not gone through so much together,
I would have written it long ago. Actually, I suspect that my decision
may be a relief to you, and that in parting we may become better friends.

I would be grateful to you if you would reply immediately.

Sincerely yours,
Sinclair Le<wis

February 3

Dear Red:

I have your letter of January 2ist. Of course we don t want to hold
your next novel by the semi-compulsion of a contract. Here is the agree
ment for the "next book" and also the one for Neighbor, which I include

1 The Nobel Prize edition of all of Lewis s books was published one week after
Lewis wrote this letter. .

2 Smith left Harcourt, Brace the end of 1928 to found his own firm, Harrison
Smith and Jonathan Cape Ltd.

302 DODSWORTH

so that your title will be completely clear. I ve endorsed them "cancelled
by mutual consent." If you will acknowledge their receipt and confirm
their cancellation, this will clear the record until you find it convenient
to return your copies with a similar endorsement

I know you have some idea of how sorry I am that events have taken
this turn. You and we have been so closely associated in our youth and
growth that I wish we might have gone the rest of the way together.
If I ve lost an author, you haven t lost either a friend or a devoted reader.

Yours,
Atf

Index

Adams, Franklin P., 35

Adams, Henry, 109

Addams, Jane, 57

Adler, Alfred, 168

Aley, Maxwell, 72

Allen, Frank Waller, 58

American Play Company, The, 60, 90-91

Anderson, Sherwood, 32, 48, 214, 299

Angell, Norman, 75

Archer, William, 94

Arliss, George, 187

Arrhenius, S. A., 168

Ashford, Daisy, 46 fn.

Astor, Lady, 131

Astor, Lord, 131

Atherton, Gertrude, 194-195

Aumonier, Stacy, 135

Austin, Mary, 56, 84, 193

Avery, Sid, 67

Ayres, Ruby, 74

Babbitt, B. T., 105 \

Babbitt, George F., 105, 106-107/138 J

Bacon, Peggy, 272, 273 VJX

Baldoroldcn, Dr., 102

Barrie, J. M., 46 fn.

Barrows, Ellen, 176

Beard, Mary, 98

Beaverbroofc, Lord, 131, 135

Bechhofer, C. E., 140

Belloc, Hilaire, i54fn.

Belloc, Hilary, 154

Benchley, Robert, 37, 42, 162

Benet, William Rose, 35, 92, 138

Bennett, Arnold, 43, 148, 151, 182, 238

Berlin, Irving, 5 f n.

Bierce, Ambrose, 194, 195

Birkhead, Rev. L. M., 206, 211, 217, 238

Bjorkman, Edwin, 59

Blackman, Rev. Earl, 217, 232, 233, 234,

236, 238

Blackwood, Algernon, 88
Block, Ralph, 153, 155, 161
Bok, Edward, 271
Booth, Franklin, 30
Bordet, Jules, 168
Bostrom, Wollmann F., 297
Boswell, James, 276
Boyd, Ernest, 182
Brady, William A., 262 fn.
Brailsford, H. N., 74
Brandes, Georg, 168
Brandt, Carl, 7, 8
Bristol, E. N., 4, 6
Brody, Mrs., 188
Bromfield, Louis, 270
Brooks, Van Wyck, 35
Broun, Heywood, 25, 28, 35, 36, 37, 39,

182, 184, 219, 300
Brown, Arthur William, 8
Brown, C. B., 202
Brown, Curtis, 132, 148
Brown, Sir George McClaren, 151
Bryant, Louise, 8, 170
Buchan, John, 130
Bullard, Arthur, 38, 41
Bullitt, William G, 237
Butcher, Fanny, 266, 271
Buder, Nicholas Murray, 210
Byron, Lord, 174

Cabell, James Branch, 13-14, 23, 25, 37,

270, 297

Cabot, Hugh, 195
Cabot, Richard, 195
Cadman, Rev. S. Parkes, 225
Call, Arthur D., 38, 41

304

Canby, Henry Seidel, 113, 172, 177, 178,

188, 266

Cane, Melville, 89, 250, 251, 254, 256, 257
Canfield, Dorothy, 12, 24, 127, 185
Cape, Jonathan, 71,96, 102, 104, 105, no,

in, 112, 127, 129, 130, 131, 132, 134,

152, 168, 172, 174, 175, 179, 184, 234, 267,

271, 273, 274, 284, 291, 293
Gather, Willa, 214, 297, 299
Chamberlain, George Agnew, 264 fn.
Chambers, Robert, 38
Qemenceau, Georges, 74, 276
Cleveland, R. M., 202
Cobb, Irvin, 259
Cohen, Octavus Roy, 64
Conrad, Joseph, 43, 88
Cornwell, Dean, 8
Cournos, John, 94
Cowles, Mrs. W. S., no
Croce, Benedetto, i<58
Curtiss, Philip, 40, 45
Curwood, James Oliver, 83 fn.

Davis, James J., 230

Dawson, Mrs. N. P., 35, 97

de Kruif, Paul, 121, 122, 123, 125, 126, 127,
128, 129, 132, 135, 136, 139, 140, 141* *44,
145, 146, 147, 148, 149, 150, 157, 160,
164, 165, 166, 167, 168, 170, 172, 174-175*

178, 184, 201, 202, 204, 210, 2U, 212, 287

Dean, Charlotte, 114, 115

Debs, Eugene, 91, 98, I38fn.

Dell, Floyd, 35, 39, 44

Delmar, Vina, 273, 285

D Herelle, Dr. Felix H., 168

Disraeli, Benjamin, 109, 174, 179

Domher, L., 170

Doran, George H., ix, x, 46, 94, 95, 156,

290, 292

Doubleday, Nelson, 292
Dreiser, Theodore, 214, 297, 299
Drinkwater, John, 94
Duncan Sisters, 74

Ernst, Bernard M. L., 253
Ervine, St. John, 113

Famous Players, 7, 8, 153, 155

Farrar, John, 178

Fay, Bernard, 243

Feipel, Louis N., 113, 114, 186-187, 263

Ferber, Edna, 47

Feuchtwanger, Lion, 250

Fishbein, Morris, 178, 195

Fitch, Clyde, 57

Fitzgerald, F. Scott, 63

INDEX

Flandrau, Charles, 40

Fletcher, Sir Walter, 131

Flexner, Abraham, 168

Foley, District Attorney, 239, 240

Follett, Wilson, 35, 168

Ford, Harriet, 60, <5i, 62, 78, 81

Forman, Henry, 41

Forster, E. M., xii, 166

Frederic, Harold, 63 fn.

Freud, Sigmund, 168

Galantiere, Lewis, 48

Gale, Zona, 42, 114

Galsworthy, John, 43, 47, 48, 49, 50, 56,

60, 63, 65, 94,1 105, no, 182
Gardner, Gilson, 28
Gardner, Mrs. Gilson, 28
Garland, Hamlin, 203 fn.
Gaston, Herbert E,, 3, 6
George, W. L., 41, 43, 71, 74
Gibbs, Sir Philip, 129, 131
Gilman, Lawrence, 35
Glasgow, Ellen, 214
Goethe, 174
Goodman, Philip, 172, 173, 175, 176, 178,

180, 185, 222
Gosse, Edmund, 43
Graham, Tom, i68fn.
Grahame- White, Claude, 74
Grant, Ulysses S,, 177
Grasset, Bernard, 174
Greenslet, Ferris, 130
Grey, Zanc, 15, 273, 274, 277, 301
Grosset, Alexander, 242, 275, 276, 287
Gruening, Ernest, i86fn.
Gruger, F. R., 8, 12
Guthrie, Ramon, 236, 238, 239, 243, 244,

251, 277

Hackett, Francis, 19, 35, 52

Haessler, Carl, 283, 284

Haggard, Sewell, 143, 145, 146, 147, 148,

149, 153, 154, 155

Hahner, Marcella Burns, 133, 171, 227
Haldeman-Julius, E., 205
Hammond, Percy, 62
Hamsun, Knut, 61
Hansen, Harry, 266
Hanson, Dr. W. G, 216
Hapgood, Norman, 57, 130, 281
Hardy, Thomas, 43
Harkness, Sam, 217
Harraden, Beatrice, 94
Harriman, Karl, 144, X45, 146
Harrison, Oliver, 176 fn,, 177
Hartman, C Bertram, 136

INDEX

305

Hays, Arthur Gareld, 240

Hays, Will, 241

Hemingway, Ernest, 297

Herbert, Victor, 5 fn.

Hergesheimer, Joseph, 10, 13, 37 fn., 38,

54

Hildebrand, Arthur, 166, 167, 183
Hirst, F. W., 74
Ho dder- Williams, Sir Ernest, 71, 74, 75,

76, 80, 127
Holt, Guy, 25, 48
Holt, Roland, 6
Hood, Fred R., 66, 185
Hopkins, Arthur, 241
Hoppe", E. O., 79, 92
Howard, G. Wren, 132
Howard, Sidney, 257
Howe, Frederic Q, 25, 28, 155, 167, 204,

244, 245

Howells, William Dean, ix
Hoyns, Henry, 9, 16, 27, 28
Hughes, Hatcher, 210
Hunt, Frazier (Spike), 130, 145, 147, 148,

153, 175, 178, 179, 211
Hurst, Fannie, 52
Hutchinson, A. S. M., 101
Huxley, Aldous, 289

International Feature Service, 136
Isham, Colonel Ralph, 276 fn.

Jefferson, Thomas, 167
Jenkins, Burris, 217
Jenkins, Herbert, 27, 28
Johnson, Dawson, 92, 174
Johnson, Owen, 109
Joyce, James, 168, 289
Jung, Carl, 168

Karlfeldt, Erik, 300

Karstner, David, 98

Kaufman, George, 130

Kearney, Patrick, 262

Kelley, Edith Summers, 75, 87, 128, 130,

131, 132, 138, 140, 141
Kelly, George, 210
Kendall, A. I., 141
Kennedy, Margaret, 178
Kerr, Philip, 131
Key, Ellen, 45
Keynes, John Maynard, xii, 24, 25, 28, 32,

84, 99

Kidd, John, id, 65
Klaw, Marc, 74
Knopf, Alfred, 206
Kochnitzky, Leon, 170

Korner, Harry, 16
Kroch, A., 227
Kyne, Peter B., 158

LaFollette, Fola, 162

Laski, Harold, 25, 65, 71, 74, 77

Leeuwenhoek, Anton van, 141

Levy, Ethel, 74

Lewis, Grace Hegger, x, 9, 10, 26, 31, 32,
33, 36, 56, 71, 78, 79, So, 82, 83, 84, 91,
93, 100, 101, 105, 106, 108, 109, 113, 114,
116, 117, 122, 123, 124, 128, 129, 131, 132,

133, i34 *35> - T 37 *39i 14, *4* H*
144, 154, 160, 168, 171, 173, 176, 178, 179,
180, 183, 185, 189, 197, 198, 199, 200, 201,

202, 204, 207, 209, 2l6, 222, 223, 231,

237, 243, 249, 251, 252-253, 254, 255-256

Lewis, Lloyd, 276

Lewis, Wells, 72,^78, 93, 134, 144, 255, 256

Lewisohn, Ludwig, 41, 236

Lincoln, Joseph, 55, 83 fn.

Lindbergh, Charles A., 242

Lindsay, Vachel, 57, 58

Lippmann, Walter, 35

Liveright, Horace, 91, 94, 98, 186, 206,

240, 290, 292
London, Jack, 194, 264
Long, Ray, 95, 96, 130, 144, 145, 271, 279,

280
Lorimer, George Horace, ix, x, 13, 14,

37, 52, 107-108

Lovett, Robert Morss, 77, 203, 205
Loving, Pierre, 230
Lowndes, Mrs. Belloc, 74
Ludwig, Emil, 258
Lynd, Helen Merrell, 270 fn.
Lynd, Robert S M 270 fn.

McComas, Mrs. Francis, 38, 41
Mclntyre, O. O., 35
McNamara, J. B., 288
Macaulay, Rose, 57 fn., 75
Macauley, Ward, 131
Macdonald, Ramsay, 130, 150
Mackenzie, Compton, 43, 105
Mannes, David, 273 fn.
Mannin, Ethel, 201
Mansfield, Katherine, 81
Marbury, Elisabeth, 60, 62
Margolies, Sam, 63
Massingham, H. J., 74
Masters, Edgar Lee, 86
Matthews, Brander, 210
Maugham, Somerset, 105
Maupin, J. C., 217
Maurice, Arthur Bartlett, 109, 167

306

Maurois, Andre, 174, 179

Mayer, Rabbi H. H., 217

Mayo, William J., 195

Meiklejohn, Alexander, 253

Melcher, Frederic G., 66

Mellish, Howard, 220

Mencken, Henry L., 19, 35, 39, 40, 43, 62,

95, "57. * 6 3 *7> *7 2 > *75, 17^ ZI 4,

216 fn., 233, 234, 236, 251, 253, 255, 256,

258, 260, 270
Merrick, Leonard, 43
Middleton, George, 162
Millay, Edna St. Vincent, 88, 89, 91
Miller, Joaquin, 194, 195
Millin, Sarah G, 178
Milton, Robert, 241, 257, 262
Montgelas, Count, 255
Mooney, Thomas, 288
Moore, George, 43, 94
Moore, Guernsey, 30
More, Paul Elmer, 100
Morehouse, Edward, 105
Morley, Christopher, 35, 169
Morris, Gouverneur, 195, 196, 197, 286-

287, 288
Munro, Wallace, in, 112

Nathan, George Jean, 2x6 fn., 258
Negri, Pola, 195, X96-I97, 198, 109
Nevinson, H. W., 74, 84
Nicholson, Meredith, 92
Nicoll, William Robertson, 74, 75
Nobel, Alfred, 297
Nobel Prize, ix, xi, 61, 296-301
Nohowel, Mrs. Frank P., 61
Nonpartisan League, 3, 6, 26
Norris, Charles G., 47, 142

O Brien, E. J., 186

O Brien, Frederick, 146

O Higgins, Harvey, 60, 61, 62, 78, 81 fn.,

89

O Neill, Eugene, 257, 299
Onions, Oliver, 74
Oppenheim, E. Phillips, 74
Osbourne, Lloyd, 129
Overton, Grant, 182, 238

Palmer, Loren, 180-181, 183
Palmieri, Teodoro, 238
Papini, Giovanni, 133, 136
Parmelee, Maurice, 131
Parrington, Vernon Louis, 276
Pasteur, Louis, 141
Patti, Adelina, 141
Pawling, Sydney S., 71

INDEX

Phelps, Hansen, 270

Phelps, William Lyon, 35, 42, 46

Piccoli, Rafaello, 89, 90

Pinker, James B., 71

Porter, Gene Stratton, 83 fn., 301

Preston, Keith, 114, 178

Pringle, Henry F., 276

Proust, Marcel, 139, 142

Pulitzer, Joseph, 209, 214, 297

Pulitzer Prize, xi, 46, 49, 203-216, 296-297

Pusey, Edward Bouverie, 195

Quinn, Michael F., 128, 132, 133

Rascoe, Burton, 19, 48, 182

Ray, Man, 169

Reed, John, 8

Reidenbach, Garence, 217

Reynolds, Paul, 197, 198

Roberts, Rev., 217

Robinson, Boardman, 130

Roosevelt, Theodore, no, 276

Rosenwald, Julius, 64

Roth, Georges, 289

Rothermell, Fred, 277, 278, 282, 283, 284,

287, 288

Roux, Pierre Paul Etnile, 168
Rowohlt, Ernst, 250, 254, 256, 258, 259,

269, 294, 295
Ruck, Berta, 74
Russell, Bertrand, 129
Rutherford, Rev., 217

Sandburg, Carl, 134, 183, 201, 214, 259,

*73

Sarg, Tony, 162
Savage, Harry, 243
Saxton, Gene, 185
Schmidt, Matthew, 288
Scott, Evelyn, 84
Scott, Geoffrey, 276
Sedgwick, Ellcry, 12
Seides, Gilbert, 168
Selfridge, Harry Gordon, 63
Shaw, Charles, 256
Shaw, George Bernard, 43, 49, 82, 84, 165,

166

Shea, Joseph E., 262 fn.
Sheean, Vincent, 278
Sherman, Stuart, 35, 42, 67, xoo, 108, xi6,

X27, 151, 170, 177, 178, 180, 184, 203 fn.,

206

Sherwood, Robert, 225, 226, 227
Shiveley, Rev,, 217
Shorter, Clement, 74
Shubert, Lee, 81

INDEX

Shubert Brothers, 60, 62, 81 fn.

Siddall, John M,, 56, 57

Siegfried, Andre, 279, 280, 281

Simpson, Percy, 72

Sinclair, May, 94, 105, 108, no, m, 168

Sinclair, Upton, 75, 109, 140

Slaughter, Mrs. William, 102

Smith, Harry Bache, 5, 21

Smith, Winchell, no, m

Smyth, Clifford, 108, no

Soule, George, 38, 92

Stallings, Helen, 287

Stallings, Laurence, 178, 182, 214, 241,

257, 284, 287-288
Stearns, Harold E., 82, 98
Steele, Wilbur Daniel, 85
Steffens, Lincoln, 286
Steichen, Edwin, 169
Sterling, George, 194-195
Stewart, Donald Ogden, 92, 135
Stidger, William L., 193, 194, 207, 216,

233, 234, 238
Stieglitz, Alfred, 169
Stoddard, Richard Henry, 195
Stokes, Brett, 105
Stokes, Frederick A., 156
Strachey, Lytton, xii, 75, 76, 99, 100, 274
Straton, John Roach, 235
Sturgis, Major General, 125
Suclcow, Ruth, 95, 96
Sunday, Billy, 250
Swinnerton, Frank, 74, 75, 92

Tarkington, Booth, 39, 59, 212
Thompson, Dorothy, 250, 255, 262, 263,

267, 268, 271, 274, 280, 283, 285, 286,

288, 290, 294, 295, 296, 299
Thompson, Grace, 133, 134
Thomson, General C. B., 150, 152, 153,

. 55

Tinker, Chauncey B., 136, 138
Tobenkin, Elias, 24
Tolstoi, Leo, 261

Toohey, John Peter, 38, 39, 40, 45
Turpin, Alice, 174
Twain, Mark, ix

Untermeyer, Louis, 134, 169, 273 fn.
Updegraff, Allan, 75, 92, 140, 236

307

Valentino, Rudolph, 196, 199

Van Doren, Carl, 47, 85-86, 170, 178, 267

Van Doren, Irita, 237, 241

Van Loon, Hendrik Willem, 156, 214

Van Vechten, Carl, 142

Veiller, Bayard, 241, 252, 253, 256, 257

Voltaire, 167

Walker, Stuart, 81

Walpole, Hugh, 43, 65, 74, 75, 92, 94, 104,

105, 112, 113, 126, 271,272, 273
Walt, Charles, 270 fn.
Warner Brothers, no, 115, 117, 153, 155,

161

Warwick, Countess of, 130
Washburn, Claude, 34, 35, 81, 85, 87, 129,

HO, 183

Wassermann, Jacob, 41
Watkins, Ann, 241, 279, 280
Webster, Harold Tucker, 273
Wells, H. G., 43, 49, 56, 75, 105, no, in,

13, i34 135, 168, 182
Wells, Leonard S., 218
Wells, Thomas B., 55, 167-168
West, Rebecca, 75, 94, 168, 235
Wharton, Edith, 43, 82, 139, 142, 168, 180,

203 fn., 214, 270, 286
Whitall, James, 75
Whitcomb, Richard, 125
White, William Allen, 48-49, 288
Williams, Blanche Colton, 186
Williams, Geoffrey, 71
Williams, Sidney, 281
Wilson, Woodrow, 174
Winter, Ella, 286
Wolfe, Thomas Clayton, 297
Wolff, Kurt, 176, 184, 188, 222
Woods, Al, 58, 60
Woodward, William, 142, 172, 235
Woolf, Virginia, xii, 289
Wright, Harold Bell, 19, 83 fn.
Wycherley, Margaret, 74
Wylie, Elinor, 138, 151, 227
Wylie, Horace, 227

Yeats, William Butler, 38
Young, Francis Brett, 271

Zweig, Arnold, 300

106230